Due to her weakened post-surgery condition, she had sought the help of a flight attendant to keep her hand-bag in the overhead cabin
New Delhi: A female cancer patient, who had recently undergone surgery, was allegedly offloaded from a New York-bound flight of American Airlines at Delhi airport after she sought assistance from a flight attendant to keep her hand-bag in overhead cabin.
The incident reported on January 30, came to light after the US-based traveller, Meenakshi Sengupta, lodged a complaint against the flight attendant for
refusing to help her put her handbag weighing more than 5 pounds in the overhead cabin as she was unable to do so because of her general, post –surgery weakness.
In her complaint to the Delhi Police and the Civil Air, Meenakshi Sengupta said she had also requested for wheelchair assistance to her seat.
“I was also wearing a brace which was visible to everyone to let everyone know I have some discomfort…because I CANNOT carry any weight in my hands at all and I’m weak from the surgery and can’t strain myself by walking a lot.” She said,
“The ground staff was very supportive and helped me get into the aircraft and put my handbag on the side of the seat. Once inside the flight, I had a conversation with the air hostess and I explained my health condition to them…None of them mentioned about putting my handbag away.
“As the flight was about to take off, cabin lights were dimmed. An air hostess came to my seat, bbut when I requested her to put my hand bag in the overhead cabin she refused flatly, saying it was not.”
Sengupta further mentioned that despite “repeated” requests for assistance she was rudely rebuffed by the air-hostes, who then walked away.
“She was extremely rude and arrogant with her words,” Sengupta alleged, adding when she went to complain about the incident the aircraft members were “largely indifferent” and told her that they did not want to interfere at all, she alleged.
“They said that if I’m so uncomfortable I should just de-board the flight. They were collective in their decision to deboard me,” Sengupta said.
“I was also wearing a brace which was visible to everyone to let everyone know I have some discomfort…because I CANNOT carry any weight in my hands at all and I’m weak from the surgery and can’t strain myself by walking a lot.” She said,
The incident also went viral on social media, with people urging the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) and Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) to take note of the matter.
“Disgusting behaviour from @AmericanAir staff towards a #cancer patient – Meenakshi Sengupta who was de-boarded from the flight because of her inability to put her handbag in the overhead cabin due to weakness and the inflight refused to help. Shameful @DCWDelhi @SwatiJaiHind kindly note @Pib_MoCA,” quoting the incident, a Twitter user said.
Meanwhile, India’s regulator- the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has taken cognisance of the case and asked American Airlines to submit its report.
The airline, in its official statement, said that its Customer Relations team has reached out to Sengupta to refund the unused portion of her ticket.
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