Family Mourning Bright Light Extinguished Too Soon

By Mark Ribble

A family from India is mourning the sudden death of their only child, while relatives in Canada are missing a bright light in their family following a fatal fire in Leamington last month.

Friday, July 8 was a day just like any other day for 23-year-old Pragya Goel, whose name has not yet been officially released by police.

She had retired to the upper apartment she rented in the 300 block of Erie Street South after speaking to her mother in India, which she did three times each day.

Pragya’s last conversation with her mom, Aruna, finished at exactly 11:08 pm on July 8. By the time the clock struck midnight, Pragya had perished in the fire.

Her regular early morning call to her mother the next day did not materialize and when Aruna reached out via text message to Pragya, it came back undelivered.

That’s when Aruna began to question what was going on. They found out later that there had been a fire in Leamington. A promising life had been extinguished far too soon.

Pragya Goel in a recent photo. The 23-year-old lost her life in a July 8 fire in Leamington.

The outgoing native of India had moved to Canada to attend college and graduated from Fanshawe College in London in 2019 with a diploma in accounting and general business.

After working briefly with the Bank of America, Pragya caught on in the warehouse of Vine Fresh Acres in Leamington in December of 2020.

“They saw potential in her, so she moved up to warehouse manager,” said her cousin Chhavi Goel, who spoke to the Sun from Toronto last week.

According to Chhavi, Pragya had moved into the upper apartment on Erie Street South in May of this year and was just getting settled into her new surroundings.

She enjoyed preparing salads, cooking, decorating her new home and spending time with her friends.

Over at Vine Fresh Acres, company owner Jake Neufeld had nothing but praise for his young employee.

“She was a very ambitious young lady,” he said. “She worked hard and looked for opportunities to advance.”

He said that Pragya’s death left an immediate impact on the rest of the workforce.

“It was very emotional and shocking to hear of her passing,” he said. “Her presence was definitely missed immediately.”

Neufeld said that Pragya had just recieved her Canadian Citizenship papers and was excited about that.

“A bright young girl, full of energy and dreams,” he added.

Pragya was an only child and had plans to further her education with courses at St. Clair College this coming fall.

Aruna last visited Canada in 2019 and had not seen her daughter in person in almost two-and-ahalf years.

Chhavi was in India visiting family when the tragedy occurred and flew back to Canada with Aruna after they were informed about Pragya’s death. The family is still waiting for answers, wondering what caused the fire that took the life of such a sweet soul.

“How can this happen in Canada?” she asked. “It’s been a trauma for all of us. We really have no answers, other than the cause is undetermined.”

For now, Aruna is staying with Chhavi and her family in Toronto and will remain there until they can hold ‘final rites’ for her daughter.

Her remains have now been released to a funeral home and the family is expecting those final rites to be held in the coming weeks.

Chhavi has started a GoFundMe page for Pragya in hopes that those who hear her story may help out in any way with funeral costs and other incidentals.

If you’d like to help the Goel family, the GoFund- Me page is called “Final Rites for Pragya” and can be found by searching that title on gofundme. com.