Airlines asked to pay Rs 35 lakh as compensation for deboarding three of family

The Punjab State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission here has ordered two airlines to jointly pay a compensation of Rs 35 lakh to a woman and her two minor children for the "mental agony, tension, harassment" suffered by them after being asked to deboard a Toronto-bound flight at Delhi airport last year.

Minali Mittal along with her two children--11 year old daughter and 3-year old son -- was travelling to Toronto in September, 2017. They boarded a Jet Airways flight from the Chandigarh International Airport at Mohali to Delhi for onward journey to Canada.

In her petition, Minali submitted that having boarded the Air Canada flight in Delhi her daughter Teesha Mittal had to use the washroom and finding it locked, she kept on waiting at its door.

It was alleged that the "washroom was emitting a foul smell," as a result of which Teesha suffered from nausea and vomited at the door of the washroom.

Commission president Justice Paramjeet Singh Dhaliwal and member Kiran Sibal in their July 23 order directed the two airlines "to pay lump sum compensation for the mental agony, tension, harassment, misbehaviour, humiliation and hardships suffered by the complainants at the hands of crew staff of opposite parties (the airlines).."
"The act of opposite parties No 4-6 (Air Canada) in deboarding complainants at Delhi airport without any sufficient, cogent, effective and valid reason, in the night hours on 03.09.2017... amounts to grave deficiency in service and adoption of unfair trade practice on part of all opposite parties, as Jet Airways was having Code Sharing Arrangement with Air Canada," the order said,