Hyderabad: Former Union minister Ghulam Nabi Azad and former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah had a bitter experience at the Bengaluru airport on Thursday night, after civil aviation authorities disallowed their special flight to Hyderabad citing technical reasons.
Mr Azad and Mr Siddaramaiah were to address Congress MLAs on the strategy to be adopted in the Assembly during Saturday’s trust vote. They were accompanied by former minister and JD(S) legislator H.D. Revanna along with some other MLAs.
All of them were seated in the special flight, waiting for the aircraft to take-off, when the civil aviation authorities refused permission. The aircraft was allowed to leave Bengaluru only after an hour. By this time, Mr Azad dropped out.
In Hyderabad, the Telangana Congress had sent party leaders Guduru Narayana Reddy and others to the Shamshabad airport to receive Mr Azad and Mr Siddaramaiah. When the flight did not arrive in time, they made inquiries about found about the glitch.
On Thursday, Congress leaders said they wanted to fly out the legislators to Kochi but were forced to take the long bus ride to Hyderabad because aviation authorities in Bengaluru declined permission for the chartered aircraft that had been arranged.
Mr Jayant Sinha, Union minister for civil aviation, however, denied any role of aviation regulator.
The minister said that anyone who wishes to use a chartered aircrafts need to get their flight plan approved by local Air Traffic Control only.
