What was to be a wonderful start to a holiday turned into an ordeal that Divya George will never forget. Divya, her husband and their child, who suffers from muscular dystrophy, were travelling to Phuket for a three-day vacation from their home in Singapore. But, unlike her earlier experiences with Scoot, a low-cost carrier, this time was to be a nightmare; Scoot is part of the Singapore Airlines group. The family were subject to a nearly hour-long ordeal as the Scoot flight's pilot refused to fly with the special needs child on her mother's lap.
Divya always makes sure to book a seat for her five-year-old daughter every time they travel. But she always holds her in her lap and uses an infant seatbelt as her daughter hardly weighs 9kg due to her condition and cannot sit on her own. This time too, she booked her a seat and requested the airline crew to issue her an infant seatbelt. Though initially the crew was helpful, it soon changed when the pilot refused to let them travel with the child on their lap.
Divya, who had detailed her experience in several Facebook posts, says that she is a frequent flyer to her hometown in Kerala. “While we’ve usually faced small problems on any airline with regard to her having an infant seatbelt because she HAS HER OWN SEAT (they somehow refuse even though she’s less than 9kg), the airline always comes through for us,” Divya said on Facebook.
“But once the pilot sees her, they [airline] let us fly without any incidents. But this time, despite explaining to the staff multiple times that my daughter cannot sit on her own, they refused to give me an infant seatbelt,” Divya told THE WEEK.
Their reasoning was that the “pilot was not comfortable letting the child sit on her mother's lap because of safety issues”. At one point, they were informed by officials that their luggage was being offloaded. They were informed that the captain wanted them removed if they were not letting their daughter sit on her allotted seat. He cited safety reasons for his inability to let them fly while holding her on their lap with an infant seatbelt.
Divya requested the pilot to come out and see the child, so that he understood her condition. But he refused to come out. The airline staff said that the captain was not interested in seeing the child. The argument continued for a good hour during which some of the other passengers advised the staff to be kind and let them travel. But to no avail.
Divya had to then approach the cockpit where the captain spoke to her through the screen, so that other passengers did not see him. “He saw my daughter and I explained her condition to him; he still refused to let me carry her on my lap,” Divya says.
But what shocked and saddened Divya more was the pilot's reply when she explained that her daughter will get hurt. He said, “If she slips and gets hurt, it is the airline's responsibility.”
“I feel that the pilot feared losing face in front of his staff and other passengers after having held his argument for so long,” Divya says. “That is why even after seeing her condition, he refused to let me hold her in my lap.”
The flight finally took off with the child buckled with a single belt in her own seat and her mother and father holding and supporting her from either sides. The mother held the child's neck and the father her body. Soon after take-off, Divya took her into her lap.
Divya has flown with her daughter more than 60 times. And nearly all these flights have been with Scoot, Silk Air or Singapore Airlines. Scoot partnered with Singapore Airlines and SilkAir in the Singapore Airlines Group family in 2017.
Divya now plans to take on Scoot on this issue. In a seemingly belated attempt at damage control, Scoot, in an email, has issued a one-time booster seat for the child, but issued no free ticket or apology.
“But after that one time, what should we do? Should my daughter never fly?”