Sena MP Ravindra Gaikwad books Air India ticket, airline cancels it
- by Carmen Reese
- in Science
- — Mar 29, 2017
Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan on Tuesday said she was considering a privilege motion by the Shiv Sena on the ban by all airlines on party member Ravindra Gaikwad. "I feel that this issue (blanket ban) should be resolved amicably through talks", said Mahajan after a meeting attended by Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju and Sena MPs. In order to discuss the issue in details, a delegation of Sena MPs had met Mahajan yesterday where they raised concern over airlines banning its leader from travelling anywhere in the country or overseas.
Air India has refused to fly the MP, following which other private airlines too refused to fly him. "We have a good safety record, did not expect in the wildest of dreams an MP would be caught doing this", Its not fair to have unequal treatment of different classes of people, he added. At times, they need to travel by plane also. "We can not allow the MP to take the flight as we feel a security threat to our crew in allowing him to fly", the spokesperson said. "I hope the ministry deals with this issue with more maturity".
Gaikwad said that while travelling in the flight, he noticed "carelessness and substandard" service of Air India and requested for a complaint book, but despite his frequent requests he was not provided the complaint book, instead the staffer misbehaved with him. The Sena has now sought to move a notice for breach of Gaikwad's privilege.
This is the second time he has travelled by train in the past four days. "Our airport employees have said that they won't attend to him and due to security reasons, we have cancelled his tickets".
The flight was scheduled for Wednesday morning.
"I was asking decent facilities and not a business class seat".
The 57-year-old first-term MP had repeatedly hit the Air India staffer on March 23 after the Pune-Delhi flight landed in the national capital.
