Disheartened that airline took action without consulting me: IndiGo captain

The pilot-in-command of the IndiGo flight in which journalist Arnab Goswami was allegedly heckled by Kunal Kamra has told airline's management that he was "disheartened" to learn the carrier took action against the comedian without consulting him and solely on the basis of social media posts.

New Delhi: The pilot-in-command of the IndiGo flight in which journalist Arnab Goswami was allegedly heckled by Kunal Kamra has told airline's management that he was "disheartened" to learn the carrier took action against the comedian without consulting him and solely on the basis of social media posts.

"As captain of 6E5317 Mumbai-Lucknow flight on January 28, I do not find...events reportable in any way. Mr Kamra's behaviour, while unsavoury, was not qualifying of a level 1 unruly passenger. Indeed, we pilots can all attest to incidents similar and/or worse in nature that were not deemed unruly," the captain said in his email to the airline's management.

The pilot also called the action by the airline against Kamra as "unprecedented".

"This is somewhat unprecedented in my nine years of airline flying. Moving forward, am I to understand that the bar for interpretation of a disruptive passenger is lower/different when it comes to high profile cases? Perhaps the SEP (safety and emergency procedures) manual is to be amended to reflect this?" the pilot added.

"I would like a clarification from the airline as this leaves a lot of room for ambiguity," he said.

When asked about the pilot-in-command's email, IndiGo said, "We have received the relevant statements and the internal committee has initiated the investigation regarding this incident.

(PTI)