Mamata, minister's oddball ride on AI

A harrowing experience for Trinamool Congress chief and Union railway minister Mamata Banerjee in an Air India (AI) flight has prompted Union minister of state for health and party MP Dinesh Trivedi, who shared the experience, to write to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for a review of the “entire working” of the ailing government carrier. On Sunday, said Trivedi, the two were returning to Delhi on flight AI 861 from Kolkata. The flight was delayed for almost an hour, as there was no pilot. Then, a man wearing jeans and a T-Shirt was seen in the cockpit, in the flight commander’s seat. “On enquiry, I was told that he was the commander, Capt A K Mohan. When I enquired why he was not in uniform, the cabin crew said the pilot had been ordered at the last minute to operate the flight,” Trivedi wrote in his letter.

It adds that further queries revealed Mohan was about to board a Hyderabad-bound flight as a passenger when he was asked to fly AI 861. “As if this was not enough, after landing in Delhi and being barely 50 yards from the parking bay, the plane was stopped as the mandatory marshal was not present.”

Eventually, according to Trivedi, a marshal came but parked the plane without the mandatory use of illuminated wands. At 11:30 pm, there was no bus for the passengers to reach the arrival lounge, as there was no commercial staff of AI available at the airport.

Also, it appears, Trivedi and Banerjee’s AI flight to Kolkata today again got delayed for similar reasons.

Trivedi has said: “There is a strong feeling that the management, at some point of time, wants to deliberately make the airlines sick.” It may be noted that the Trinamool Congress is generally against any dilution of state sector ownership and opposes privatisation, as a rule.

Trivedi has also alleged that many lucrative routes of the airlines have been given up to private airlines. “I can provide you with details of hundreds of such routes,” Trivedi wrote to PM. 

Mamata, Sonia discussion
Meanwhile, amidst the other tussle between the Congress and the Trinamool Congress over the Land Acquisition (Amendment) Bill, Banerjee today held a 25-minute meeting with Congress president and United Progressive Alliance chief Sonia Gandhi.

Banerjee denied any discussion on the Land Bill issue, pending before the government for more than three years. “I discussed all issues, including the state terror perpetrated by the CPI(M),” Banerjee said.