Passenger protests flare up again after more Air India flights are diverted

Thiruvananthapuram: Protests continued against India’s national carrier Air India after three more flights were diverted on Saturday.

The incident occurred just a day after the tension at Thiruvananthapuram airport, when an Air India Express captain signalled a hijack alarm after passengers on a flight from Abu Dhabi became angry at being told they may have to make their way to their final destination of Kochi by road because of a technical problem.

Saturday’s protests flared up after three flights from the Gulf to Kerala’s Karipur airport in Kozhikode were diverted to Nedumbassery airport, citing weather conditions.

Passengers on one of the flights from Bahrain protested when they were asked to proceed to Kozhikode by road after being made to wait at Nedumbassery for five hours.

Eventually, another flight was made available, but more trouble awaited them in Kozhikode when their luggage failed to arrive, although authorities promised the issue would be resolved quickly.

Two other flights, a Jeddah-Kozhikode flight and a Sharjah-Kozhikode flight that were also diverted to Nedumbassery, were then flown to Kozhikode.

Opposition leader VS Achuthanandan said the incidents showed the apathy of Air India towards its passengers and he demanded that the cases filed against six passengers in the Abu Dhabi-Kochi Air India Express flight on Friday, which is now under investigation, be withdrawn after it was revealed that passengers had not attempted to storm the cockpit or threaten the pilot.