National carrier Air India has been rapped by a consumer court for failing to inform passengers in time about a delayed flight and directed to pay a compensation of Rs 50,000 to a complainant, five years after the incident.
"In this case, no information was conveyed to the complainant after the initial information about the flight being delayed for hours and subsequent enquiry failed to yield any result in consequence whereof the complainant had to go to airport," the Delhi State Consumer Commission said, upholding the district forum's direction to the carrier to pay the compensation to the complainant.
The airline approached the Commission challenging the Delhi District Forum's direction to pay Rs 50,000 compensation to the complainant along with Rs 10,000 as costs for the incident that occurred in 2005.
The Commission bench, comprising President Justice B A Zaidi and member M L Sahni, took note of the inconvenience and misery caused to passenger, Inder Mohan Taneja, by the misconduct of the airlines's officials. "Even the arrangements for the passenger for transport from the airport back to the hotel were not appropriate and were extremely uncomfortable.
A very uncomfortable feature was that the baggage of the complainant was not returned to them and they suffered great inconvenience at the hotel in its absence thereof," it said while dismissing the appeal. The Commission said that the airline functionaries acted in a "very discourteous and negligent manner in consequence whereof the complainant was put to great hardship and inconvenience."
An Air India flight, which was to fly to Delhi from London Heathrow Airport, was delayed by two days. However, the information was not disseminated among passengers causing inconvenience to them.
Air India, however, had paid Rs 11,400 towards fare and Rs 3,800 as compensation to each of the persons who registered complaints with the carrier but Taneja chose to approach the consumer court seeking higher damages. PT
