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In what passengers described as an unprofessional approach, six Chennai-bound people were lured out of an IndiGo airlines flight at Bengaluru airport on Sunday night by its ground team, saying an alternative aircraft was waiting for them to fly to Chennai. The passengers, including two elderly people, soon realised they had been tricked into disembarking and there was no second plane. All were forced to stay overnight in the city and fly out on Monday.
The unpleasant incident unfolded at Kempegowda International Airport (KIA) around 9.30pm on Sunday, soon after the landing of IndiGo flight 6E 478 from Amritsar to Chennai via Bengaluru, where a majority of passengers disembarked. “We landed in Bengaluru two hours late as the flight took off late from Amritsar and was scheduled to fly to Chennai. Six passengers, including I, were seated in the plane on the Bengaluru tarmac when I received a call on my cellphone from an IndiGo ground crew member, identifying himself as Lokesh, asking me to get off the flight as he was waiting for me inside the airport with my boarding pass for another flight, ready to depart to Chennai. I got off, trusting his words,” recalled a passenger. The other five also received similar phone calls and got off.
This significant achievement not only makes IndiGo the first airline in the country to reach this operational pinnacle but also positions it among the top 10 airlines globally in both frequency and seat capacity, according to the latest OAG Data for October 2023. This milestone underscores the airline’s unwavering growth on both domestic and international fronts.
The six Chennai-bound passengers tracked down the IndiGo staffer at KIA, only to realise there was no other Chennai-bound plane waiting for them or new boarding passes in their name. “We were furious over the IndiGo staff blatantly lying to get us off the plane, when the truth was there was no flight to Chennai for the night and we were held up in Bengaluru,” the passenger lamented.The IndiGo staff initially offered no assistance, including hotel for the night. “IndiGo’s assistant manager Lloyd Pinto at the airport arrived but acted cold with no sympathy for even the elderly passengers who were stranded. Finally, after admitting it was their fault, they had the audacity to deny us an airport hotel, saying we aren’t eligible for a stay there,” said another passenger, adding that the airline eventually admitted that they couldn’t take off to Chennai with just six passengers.
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