Air India 'pee-gate' case: There was no 9B seat! Cabin crew union wants Air India to reinstate crew, pilot

New Delhi, Jan 23: Calling the action against the pilot in command an "unusually harsh punishment", the Air India cabin crew union has termed the findings of an internal committee "incredulous" and "flawed" and has demanded that 15 of its members and four pilots be reinstated on flights.

The development comes after the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) slapped a penalty on the airline over the pee-gate incident. Further, the watchdog said the license of the pilot-in-command of the said flight has been suspended for three months for failing to discharge his duties as per Rule 141 of the Aircraft Rules, 1937 and applicable DGCA CAR.

It said, "There is no seat 9B on the Air India 777-300 ER and our (15) Crew & (4) Pilots did not personally appear before the ICC committee to depose before them either."

This statement by the AICCA contradicted the internal committee's finding that reportedly said accused Shankar Mishra stood at 9B and urinated on the complainant, an elderly woman, seated on 9A.

"That report, which has been submitted to DGCA (Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA)), also respectfully, seems based on wrong facts and incorrect assumptions and hence a nullity," the AICCA said.

The incident of passenger misbehavior occurred on AI-102 flight from New York to Delhi on November 26 last year, wherein Mishra was drunk when he allegedly urinated on an elderly female co-passenger in the business class of an Air India New York-Delhi flight on November 26 last year. In a surprise twist, he later claimed the woman had urinated on herself.

"We would particularly like to point that the Internal Inquiry Committee's ruling hinges upon their incorrect understanding of the layout of the Aircraft. When the Committee could not find an adequate explanation as to how the accused could have urinated on the complainant sitting on seat 9A without also affecting the passenger on Seat 9C, it has erroneously gone on to assume that there was a seat 9B in the business class in the aircraft," according to the statement issued by Mishra's lawyers, Ishanee Sharma and Akshat Bajpai.

Mishra is currently in judicial custody in a criminal case registered by the Delhi Police for allegedly exposing himself before the victim woman in a drunken state and urinating on her.

The statement issued by the lawyers emphasised that Mishra was innocent and has full faith in the judicial system of the country.

On January 11, a Delhi court had denied bail to him while calling the act "utterly disgusting and repulsive".

Metropolitan Magistrate Komal Garg had said the act has shocked the civic consciousness of people and needed to be deprecated.