Air India pilot strike sends passengers into a tizzy

“Till late this morning,call centres were telling passengers that all flights are on time. We had to call them back and inform them about the pilot strike,” said Jay Bhatia,chaiperson of the Travel Agents’ Association of India (West).

Till Wednesday evening,the airline had cancelled 21 departing flights from Mumbai,while 12 arrivals had been cancelled,a MIAL spokesperson said. According to Air India spokespersons,despite the strike call the airline had managed to operate 28 flights in and out of Mumbai till 3 pm. “Most of the flights were operated with the help of executive pilots,” said a spokesperson.

Air India passengers travelling to non-metro cities like Gwalior and Udaipur were among the worst hit. The Makhijas were put on a flight to Delhi — from there,they had to take the road to Gwalior. Another passenger Anuj Bajaj was coordinating with his mother in Gwalior and the airline counter staff at the Mumbai airport to get a convenient flight back to Mumbai. Bajaj’s mother was initially scheduled for a 3 pm flight from Gwalior back to Mumbai,but as the flight was cancelled,she had to consider coming to Delhi by road to connect to Mumbai. “We arranged for a group of passengers to travel by road from Udaipur to Ahmedabad,from where they caught the evening flight to Mumbai,” said Bhatia.

Many other passengers were rescheduled on later flights. Atinder Sachdev and his wife were travelling to Delhi to attend an evening function. “Our flight was rescheduled at 3 pm,then 5 pm and later at 7 pm. We will reach Delhi after the function is over,” Sachdev said.