MANAGER, SOUTHERN REGION, AIR INDIA, MADRAS vs V.KRISHNASWAMY

THIS appeal arises out of Complaint Petition No. 131 of 1992 filed by the respondent hereinbefore the State Commission, Madras against the Manager, Southern Region, Air India, Madras (Respondent No. 1), the Airport Manager of Air India at Meenambakkam Airport, Madras (Respondent No. 2), Dupty Officer of Air India at the Madras Airport (Respondent No. 3) and another Officer of Air India at Meenambakkam Airport by name Sri K.R. Narayanan (Respondent No. 4) claiming to recover from the said Opposite Parties a total amount of Rs. 9,50,000/-by way of damages on the ground that as a consequence of deficiency in service and alleged high handed behaviour on the part of Opposite Parties, the complainant was prevented from boarding Air India flight A.I. 424 which was scheduled to leave Madras at 1320 Hrs. on 22.4.1992 for Singapore inspite of his having held a confirmed ticket to travel from Madras to Singapore by the said flight. It was alleged in the complaint petition that the complainant had reached the International Airport at Meenambakkam, Madras on the date in question at 12 Noon in order to take the flight to Singapore which was scheduled to depart at 1320 Hrs. After checking in at the Air India counter and obtaining the boarding pass and baggage, ticket etc. he claims to have proceeded for immigration and customs clearances and thereafter after completing the security check, he proceeded to the aerobridge to board the aircraft. But the Opposite Parties 3 and 4 are said to have stopped him at the entrance of the aircraft snatched away from him his boarding Pass and did not allow him to board the aircraft It is further alleged in the complaint that the complainant was manhandled by aforementioned respondents and pushed back to the waiting hall (departure lounge) and was thereafter taken to the Air India Office where after a long time his documents were returned to him with an endorsement on the ticket coupon that he had been off loaded due to late reporting of Government formalities. According to the version of the complainant, all these were done by Opposite Parties 3 and 4 for the purpose of allotting his seat in the plane to someone else. It is alleged that by reason of his having been prevented from proceeding to Singapore by the said flight, he was unable to keep up his business commitments and lost the opportunity to enter into contracts for which arrangements had all been made and as a consequence thereof, he lost his chance to earn a profit of Rs. 8,50,000/-. In addition, he suffered great mental agony for which he claimed an additional compensation of Rupees one lakh, thereby bringing the total compensation claimed in the complaint petition to Rs. 9,50,000/-.

IN the joint counter-statement filed by the Opposite Parties before the State Commission it was pointed out that the complainant had admittedly reached the International Airport at Meenambakkam, Madras only at 12 Noon though the instruction given to passengers taking International flights was that they should arrive at the Airport three hours in advance of the schedule time of departure of the flight. But despite his having come late, the complainant was promptly attended by personnel at the Air India counter and was given the boarding pass, baggage ticket etc. and advised to get the other formalities completed and report to the departure lounge in time for the flight. At 1315 Hrs. when all the passengers .bound for Singapore had boarded the aircraft, it Wk as found by the staff of Air India on duty that only 63 passengers had boarded the plane at Madras instead of 64 persons who were listed on the manifest. On checking, it was found that the complainant, whose name was included in the manifest was missing'' and on a search being made for him it was discovered that the complainant was still in the custom area awaiting customs clearance. When the staff of the Opposite Parties approached and requested him to hurry up they learnt on inquiry that the complainant was not being cleared by the customs officials due to his not fulfilling certain custom requirements. It was gathered that the complainant, who is a Non-Resident Indian, had imported certain items free of duty while coming into India on condition that those items could be re-exported at the time of his departure from the country and the delay was on account of the fact that the complainant could not be granted clearance to board the aircraft since he had not produced those items before the custom authorities. At 1320 Hrs. which was the scheduled time of departure for the aircraft, the customs authorities gave statutory clearance to Air India only for 63 passengers i.e. excluding the complainant. According to the Opposite Parties, since the scheduled departure time of the flight had already arrived and it would not be right to delay the flight and cause inconvenience to all the other passengers who had already boarded the aircraft especially when it was not known whether and when the complainant could at all be cleared by the custom authorities for taking the flight, the doors of the aircraft were closed, the aerobridge was disconnected and the pushing back of the aircraft to proceed to the take off point was commenced. It was at that point of time that the complainant came rushing towards the aerobridge. Since the doors of the aircraft had already been closed and the plane had been moved away from the aerobridge he was stopped by the Duty staff of Air India manning the area and it was explained to the complainant that since the flight had already started it could not be brought back. The allegations made by the complainant that he had arrived at the aerobridge when the door of the aircraft was remaining open and his boarding pass was forcibly snatched from him and he was pushed and manhandled by the staff of Air India were all denied in the counter as totally false and devoid of any factual foundation. According to the Opposite Parties, the complainant had missed his flight only because of his having come to the airport late and having been unable to secure clearance from the custom authorities in time to report at the departure lounge before the doors of the aircraft were closed and the plane was pushed away from the aerobridge. Hence it was submitted on the side of the Opposite Parties that there was no deficiency, negligence or misconduct on their part and the claim for recovery of compensation should be rejected as unsustainable. The complainant examined himself as PW 1 and marked Exhibits A-l to A-10 as documentary evidence on his side. On the side of the Opposite Parties, the Duty Officer, Air India and Sri K.R. Narayanan, Officer, Air India at Madras (who have been impleaded as Respondent Nos. 3 and 4 in the complaint petition) were examined as RWs 1 and 2. In addition, the Assistant Manager, Air India Security at Meenambakkam Airport was examined as RW-3. Exhibits B-l to B-7 were also marked on the side of the Opposite Parties.

BY the order under appeal, the State Commission has upheld the claim of the complainant that there was deficiency in service on the part of the Opposite Parties and awarded to the complainant a sum of Rs. 2,25,000/- as compensation for loss of profit and mental pain and agony. In this appeal the appellants have challenged the legality and correctness of the aforesaid decision rendered by the State Commission.

BEING a first appeal, we have carefully examined in detail, the oral and documentary evidence adduced on both sides. The main case put forward by the complainant was that he had reported at the aerobridge at a time when the door of the aircraft was still open but was nevertheless prevented by Opposite Parties 3 and 4 from boarding by forcibly snatching away the boarding pass and pushed and manhandled him. No finding at all on this crucial allegation of forcible snatching of boarding pass and manhandling, pushing etc. has been rendered by the State Commission. We consider it strange that there is not even any discussion pi this matter in the order passed by the State Commission. After carefully scanning the evidence, we have no hesitation to come to the conclusion that the aforesaid allegations put forward by the complainant are totally untrue. The motive attributed by the complainant to the respondents Nos. 3 and 4 in forcibly preventing him from boarding the flight is that they wanted to give the complainant''s seat to some other passenger. It has been convincingly established in evidence vide the load sheet Exhibit-B2 that the plane was under loaded when the flight took off and there were several seats lying vacant. We accept as true the testimony given by R.Ws. 1 and 2 and disbelieve the version given by the complainant in his deposition as PW 1. We hold that the evidence establishes that the complainant had come to the entrance to the aerobridge only after the door of the aircraft had been closed the aerobridge disconnected and the plane had been moved away from the aerobridge in the process of its being pushed to the runway for take off.

THUS it is seen that the complainant had approached the State Commission with a false and concocted story of his boarding pass having been forcibly snatched from him and is having been subjected to physical pushing and manhandling by Opposite Parties 3 and 4. We find that there had not been any forcible snatching of the boarding pass of the complainant nor any pushing or manhandling of the complainant by these witnesses. It is very clear from the evidence of R.Ws. 1 to 3 that customs clearance was given only for 63 passengers after deleting the name of the complainant is fully borne out by the general declaration from Exhibit B-l which contains the signatures of the health official, the immigration official and custom official. We see no justification whatsoever for the remark made by the State Commission that "in all probability the General Declaration document (Exhibit B-1) is got up for the purpose after the flight". No such suggestion was made to R.Ws. 1 to 3 during their Cross-examination and it was not fair and proper on the part of the State Commission to cast groundless aspersions against the genuineness and veracity of the public document Exhibit B-1 in the absence of any material #to warrant such suspicion. The evidence on record makes it clear that customs clearance was initially refused to the complainant by the custom officer who was on duty at the counter and it was only after the complainant went to the Assistant Collector of Customs and made representations to the said Officer that a direction for grant of clearance was later on given by the said officer pursuant to which the lady custom officer on duty at the counter finally gave clearance. But, by that time, it was too late because the departure time of the Aircraft had already passed and the door of the plane had been closed and the plane had been pushed away after disconnecting the aerobridge. In these circumstances, we see no justifiable ground at all for sustaining the finding recorded by the State Commission that the Opposite Parties were guilty of gross deficiency and negligence.

WE are not able to share the view expressed in the order of the State Commission that it was the duty of the Opposite Parties to examine as a witness on their side the Lady Customs Officer who had originally refused customs clearance to the complainant and subsequently gave the clearance pursuant to written orders issued by her superior officer. In our opinion the burden of proving that he had obtained customs clearance on time and had reported at the aerobridge before the boarding was closed was entirely on the complainant and in our view if the complainant did not choose to examine the customs officer there was no legal obligation at all to summon her as a witness. The State Commission was manifestly in error in drawing an adverse inference against the Opposite Parties merely on the ground of their not having examined the Lady Customs Officer as a witness. The main reasoning on the basis of which the State Commission has founded its conclusion on the question of negligence and deficiency is that the Opposite Parties could well have waited for five or ten minutes even after the scheduled departure time had been reached in order to await a final word from the custom counter, and there was no reason why there was such hurry in clearing the flight for keeping the flight schedule. After so stating, the State Commission has proceeded to make the following remarks which, in our opinion, were totally uncalled for:" "Is delay in flights for hours for the sake of VIPs and VVIPs unknown in our country wedded thought we are to a democratic polity? Air India''s MAHARAJA cannot be expected to treat every passengers as a VIP-it is often claimed to be so but should not "HIS HIGHNESS" show to an ordinary passengers, the elementary human courtesy, concern and consideration which every man owes to every other man? R.Ws. 1 and 2 have in our view exhibited a callous, careless and cavelier attitude towards the inconvenience, nay, hardship of a passenger holding a confirmed ticket and whose name has been included in the flight manifest. If this does not amount to negligence, what else could it be?"

With due respect to the State Commission, we are firmly of the opinion that such remarks should not have found a place in its order. We are totally unable to share the view expressed by the Slate Commission that there is in obligation on the part of the airlines to hold its flight beyond the scheduled time of departure in Order to await the arrival of a passenger who had not reported at the departure lounge in time. It is of the utmost essentiality that strict punctuality should be maintained with respect to the departure timings of the international flights, because, otherwise, very serious inconvenience may be caused to passengers on board who may have to take connecting flights to other countries after reaching the terminus of the flight in question. The generalised observation made in the State Commission''s order concerning alleged delaying of flights for accommodating the convenience of the "VIPs etc." do not appeal to us as of any relevance in the context of the present case. We are inclined to characterise this observation as completely off the mark for the purpose of deciding the case on hand. It would not be right to cast an obligation on any airlines to delay the departure of an aircrat (particularly in the case of an international flight) beyond the scheduled time of the departure to await late arrival of any passenger, whosoever he may be, howsoever, highly or lowly placed. If such obligation is to be recognised as existing in law it will result in gross uncertainty in the departure of flight because it may have to be held up to await the arrival of several passengers who may turn up late. We hold that the evidence on record show that no negligence or deficiency in service can be attributed to the Opposite Parties in having taken steps to see that the flight in question departed from Madras airport on time.

WE do not think that the State Commission was right in expressing the view that even if the complainant had to board the plane after the doors of the plane were closed and the plane was in the process of being pushed back from the aerobridge after disconnection of the aerobridge, the respondents should have recalled the plane for accommodating the complainant. If such obligation is to be recognised as subsisting on the shoulders of airlines officials, it will well nigh be possible to any aircraft to depart from airport on time because one passenger after another may turn up late and ask the plane to be recalled to the aerobridge in order to enable him to board the plane. We are totally unable to agree with the aforesaid view expressed by the State Commission.

ON a careful examination and study of all the evidentiary material available on record, documentary as well as oral, we are unhesitatingly of the view that the inability of the complainant to board the flight in question was only due to his own delay in reporting at the airport and his failure to present himself at the departure longue in time after obtaining immigration and custom clearance etc., and there was no kind of negligence or deficiency in service on the part of the Opposite Parties. In the light of the conclusion reached by us as above, on the question of negligence and deficiency, it is unnecessary for us to proceed to examine the reasonableness of the quantum of compensation awarded to the complainant by the State Commission.

IN the result, this appeal is allowed, the order of the State Commission is set aside and the complaint petition filed by the respondent herein is dismissed. The complainant will pay a sum of Rs. 5,000/- to the appellant by way of costs of this appeal.