File photo used for representational purpose.
| Photo Credit: Reuters
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has served a show-cause notice on Air India after an 82-year-old woman passenger suffered brain injuries from a fall at the Delhi airport following delay in providing her a wheelchair, Minister for Civil Aviation Ram Mohan Naidu informed Parliament.
The Ministry took immediate cognisance of the incident and is enquiring into it in-depth, the Minister told the Rajya Sabha in response to a question from Congress member Priyanka Chaturvedi who asked about measures being taken by airlines for providing wheelchairs and assistance to senior citizens and other priority passengers in the light of the recent incident.
“We assure the members that we are looking into the issue,” the Minister said.
On March 4, Raj Pasricha, 82, had a fall at the Delhi airport after her family waited for 15-20 minutes for a wheelchair but none was available, forcing her to walk to the check-in counter. She was later admitted to a Bengaluru hospital, where she remained in the Intensive Care Unit for four days, before being finally discharged from the hospital. The airline has said it advises passengers to report two hours before flight departure, while the passenger and her family arrived at the airport less than 90 minutes before their flight. Check-in counters for domestic flights close 60 minutes before departure time.
Last week, a team of DGCA officials met the senior citizen’s family at the Command Hospital in Bengaluru. The DGCA will also be holding a meeting with airlines on the matter and is expected to make recommendations on wheelchair provisioning at airports as complaints abound regarding their shortage and delays in making them available to genuine passengers
The Disability Rights Network wanted the report into the Air India investigation be made public.
Published – March 17, 2025 09:32 pm IST