- Tuesday, February 25, 2025
The accused passenger, Sahil Katariya, was arrested.
By: Shubham Ghosh
A DAY after a passenger on a flight run by India’s IndiGo was arrested for allegedly assaulting a pilot when the latter was making an announcement over a delay in the takeoff at the airport in Delhi, civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said such instances were unacceptable.
“Incidences of unruly behaviour amidst this are unacceptable, and will be dealt with strongly in line with the existing legal provisions,” he said in a long post on X.
A purported video of the incident, which took place Sunday (14) evening, surfaced on social media and showed the passenger identified as Sahil Katariya, wearing a yellow jacket, hitting the pilot while he was making the announcement inside the aircraft. A few air-hostesses were seen trying to stop him apart from another person, who seemed to be another passenger.
Read: India aviation regulator DGCA takes up IndiGo engine failure with Pratt & Whitney
Yesterday, Delhi witnessed unprecedented fog wherein visibility fluctuated for several hours, and at times, dropped to zero between 5 AM to 9 AM.
The authorities, therefore, were compelled to enforce a shut-down of operations for some time even on CAT III runways (CAT III…
— Jyotiraditya M. Scindia (@JM_Scindia) January 15, 2024
Operations at airports in north India, especially Delhi, were significantly impacted by dense fog on Sunday resulting in diversion, cancellation and delay of several flights.
Read: India civil aviation minister Scindia hails IndiGo’s record 500-jet order with Airbus
TO ALL AND SUNDRY
Once you’re in the aircraft, especially if the doors are closed, different rules apply
If you charge towards cockpit like this (whatever be the reason)
You’re looking at some long “me time” behind bars
Airlines don’t have control over WEATHER, FOG etc
BE… pic.twitter.com/mr7aWzsJH0— Dr MJ Augustine Vinod ?? (@mjavinod) January 15, 2024
Scindia also said in his post that all stakeholders were working round the clock to minimise fog-related impact.
IndiGo also issued a statement related to the matter, saying Katariya “assaulted” the co-pilot of the Goa-bound plane and the matter had been referred to an independent internal committee for the inclusion of the former’s name on the “no-fly list”.
In another video clip, Katariya was seen being taken out of the aircraft by security personnel even as he apologised for his conduct.
He was then taken to a police station and later arrested.
According to the police, the co-pilot of flight number 6E 2175, between Delhi and Goa, and other security personnel gave a complaint regarding one passenger assaulting and misbehaving with them in the flight.
Katariya misbehaved and hit co-pilot Anup Kumar and created nuisance inside the aircraft, the complaint stated.
The passenger was agitated as the flight was delayed for several hours, police said.
The flight took off from Delhi at 6 pm after a delay of more than 12 hours, according to flight tracking website flightradar24.
In a statement, IndiGo said the passenger was declared unruly and handed over to the local law enforcement agencies for further action as per protocol.
A case under sections 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), 341 (punishment for wrongful restraint) and 290 (punishment for creating public nuisance) of the Indian Penal Code and section 22 of the Aircraft Rules has been registered against the passenger and investigation taken up, another police officer said.
Speaking about the fog conditions, Scindia said Delhi witnessed unprecedented fog on Sunday wherein visibility fluctuated for several hours, and at times, dropped to zero between 5 am and 9 am.
“The authorities, therefore, were compelled to enforce a shut-down of operations for some time even on CAT III runways (CAT III runways cannot handle Zero-Visibility operations). The decision was taken keeping passenger safety in mind, which remains the foremost priority for all in the aviation ecosystem,” he added on X.
Cold wave conditions continued to grip north India, with the minimum temperature in the Indian capital dropping to three degrees Celsius on Sunday night — the lowest so far this season for the national capital.
