India offers an $8,000 reward for information leading to the disappearance of a transport plane carrying 13 people.

The Indian Air Force and the Arunachal Pradesh state government announced on June 8th a reward of 550,000 rupees (nearly $8,000) for village chiefs to organize searches for the AN-32 military transport plane that went missing on June 3rd with 13 people on board, including 8 crew members and 5 soldiers.

The Soviet-made aircraft disappeared near the Chinese border, and to date, aerial searches, satellite surveys, and attempts to locate the plane's signal have all failed.

In addition to using satellites from the Indian Space Research Organization and other high-tech equipment, ground-based teams are scouring the Mechuka jungle in search of the missing aircraft.

The Air Force said it would reward 500,000 rupees (over $7,200) and local authorities would reward 50,000 rupees ($720) for "reliable information" that helps find the plane.

Rewards for finding missing aircraft are quite rare. An $80 million reward was offered for the discovery of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, which disappeared en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in 2014, but its whereabouts remain unknown to this day.

The Indian Army has deployed nine helicopters along with numerous fighter jets and transport aircraft to search for the plane. The ground search operation is concentrated mainly in Siang district and is being carried out by police, air force, infantry, border forces, and local residents. Bad weather has hampered the operation in recent days, but the large-scale search effort resumed yesterday.