Nearly two months after the urinating incident on a New York-New Delhi flight, Air India on Tuesday said it has closed an internal probe into the matter and will help the flight’s pilot-in-command appeal against the suspension of his license. Will do The airline as DGCA considers the action “excessive”. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) last week suspended the pilot’s license for three months, imposed a fine of Rs 30 lakh on Air India and Rs 3 lakh on the airline’s director of in-flight services. The incident is of 26 November 2022.
Tata Group-owned Air India on Tuesday said it has closed an internal inquiry into the actions of its crew operations and administrative staff supporting AI 102 (New York-New Delhi) flight on November 26, 2022.
In a statement, the airline said it accepts that despite mitigating circumstances based on the letter of the CAR (Civil Aviation Requirement), it did not correctly classify the incident and therefore did not report it as required.
“Warning letters have been issued to the crew and ground staff to strictly adhere to the CAR definition of ‘uncontrollable’ while reporting incidents onboard so that subsequent investigation can assess the facts. Cabin crew and ground staff have been advised and have returned to duty,” it said.
In light of the hardships and financial losses already incurred by the crew during the period of de-rostering, Air India said it considers the license suspension of the commander excessive and will assist him with the appeal.
“Air India would like to acknowledge the good faith efforts made by the crew to handle the situation effectively in real time when all the facts were not available. The actions of the cabin crew and their criticism of the pilot were in the context of not being given the upgrade ‘, the statement said.
On 21 January, PTI reported that the Indian Pilots Guild (IPG), the umbrella body of Air India pilots, was considering legal recourse and other options with regard to the suspension of pilot’s license by the DGCA for three months.
Giving details of the aftermath of the incident, Air India said the complainant approached the crew and sought assistance after a fellow passenger allegedly urinated on him.
“In the absence of any witness, the crew took the allegation of the complainant at face value and helped her by providing new clothes, clearing her luggage and shifting her to another business class seat of similar type .When awoke and confronted .with the allegation, the alleged perpetrator was calm, cooperative and unaware of the allegation,” it said.
The airline also clarified that the accused passenger was not served “excessive alcohol” by the crew and the crew did not appear “intoxicated”.
It also said that the commander was regularly informed by the cabin crew.
Air India said, “In the judgment of the crew, the alleged offender at no point of time posed any risk to flight safety.”
Recognizing that, taking the allegation of the complainant at face value and providing assistance immediately, it follows that the matter should have been reported as a prima facie case of a passenger “…other passengers behaving in a disorderly manner towards”.
Air India said that the matter should have been classified and reported as such without prejudice to any subsequent investigation of facts.
Noting that upon receipt of the trip report, the airline said that the ground staff “did not challenge the assessment of the crew” and therefore, “did not report the matter as an uncontrolled incident”.
According to the airline, “based on the absence of witnesses to the alleged act, that the alleged perpetrator was peaceful, cooperative and claiming ignorance of the incident, that there was no risk to flight safety and that a resolution had been observed between parties, the crew made a judgment call to record the matter as a (non-reportable) in-flight incident rather than a (reportable) case of uncontrollability.
Further, Air India stated that in the absence of witnesses to the alleged act, the crew were being “asked to infer the guilt of the accused which is contrary to natural justice and due process”.
Shankar Mishra, accused in the case of urination incident, is still in jail.
With inputs from PTI