The Indian Air Force on Wednesday confirmed that Flying Officer A Sinha, who was piloting the MiG-27 aircraft that crashed during a routine training flight in North Bengal on May 19, was killed.

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Sinha, hailing from Jamshedpur, was a newly commissioned officer and his family has been informed of his death, an IAF spokesman said in Shillong.

A defence spokesman at the Eastern Command headquarters in Kolkata also confirmed that the pilot was dead and his body was found with the wreckage of the plane inside the Gumla reserve forest near Bagdogra airbase.

Apparently the pilot could not eject when the plane went out of control in bad weather during its flight from Hashimara airfield to Bagdogra in North Bengal, he said.