IndiGo pilot who 'threatened' passengers 'off-rostered', says aviation minister

Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri ordered his office to contact IndiGo

indigo-salil IndiGo aircraft | Salil Bera

Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Tuesday informed that IndiGo airlines had "off-rostered" a captain-rank pilot who had allegedly threatened a journalist and her 75-year-old mother on a Chennai-Bengaluru flight.

Puri tweeted he had asked his office to contact IndiGo as soon as he saw a tweet by Supriya Unni Nair, an independent journalist. Puri said IndiGo informed the ministry of civil aviation that the pilot had been taken off the flying roster pending a "full enquiry".

Supriya Unni Nair, a journalist based in Bengaluru, posted a series of tweets early on Tuesday about her ordeal on IndiGo flight 6E 806 from Chennai to Bengaluru. She wrote that the flight's captain, referred to as Jayakrishna "harassed, threatened and prevented me and my 75-year-old diabetic mom from disembarking the flight and threatened to arrest us because we asked for wheelchair assistance".

Nair claimed the incident happened when she walked up to the flight crew to remind them of the need for a wheelchair for her mother.

Nair wrote the stewardess "claimed we don't have access to a wheelchair when it was clearly printed on the ticket". Nair claims when she told the stewardess about this, "the captain came barging out and yells at me for pressing the assistance button and annoying him and his crew". Nair alleged the captain prevented the wheelchair crew from taking her mother out of the aircraft and threatened, "he will ensure we are detained and spend a night in jail".

When Nair's mother asked the captain not to be rude, Nair wrote, he said “he is the captain, his job is to fly the plane here and not be polite to mere passengers. You have paid piddly 2,000 rupees, you don't own the aircraft he adds. I will make sure you are barred from the skies."

The captain allegedly did not pay heed to a request from the flight stewardess to stop his tirade. Nair alleged the IndiGo captain told her, "Yes I will threaten you. I am a captain. You cant touch us," which she wrote was a reference to the top brass of IndiGo.

Nair wrote “the security folks and the Indigo ground staff meanwhile come and try and get us off the flight. We reach the bus and the 'captain' is meanwhile ranting and stops it from moving forward". She added the delay affected her mother's medication schedule.

Nair added her ordeal was not over after leaving the aircraft: “Once we reach the arrival lounge, we are held back again. Jayakrishna is standing there ranting that 'we' are not slaves, threatening me with dire consequences if I post about this on social media.” She wrote the security staff and the IndiGo personnel in the ground crew were supportive and had apologised to her profusely. By then, her mother had started becoming dizzy due to delay in taking her diabetes medicines.

Jayakrishna even warned "an FIR" will be filed against Nair and her mother. She alleged that none of the cabin crew on board the flight "intervened or helped them”.

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