Thousands of passengers who reached the airport were left in the lurch as they saw their flight was either cancelled or delayed.
Hyderabad: On a day 144 IndiGo flights were either cancelled or delayed at the Shamshabad airport here on Saturday, including 74 arrivals and 70 departures, chaos and confusion prevailed at the departure hall.
Thousands of passengers who reached the airport were left in the lurch as they saw their flight was either cancelled or delayed. Some passengers who crowded the IndiGo reservation counter broke into tears on finding out their flights were affected, while several others entered into arguments with the staff, stating they had been stranded for several hours without any information regarding their flight.
Passengers said their travel plans and onward plans had gone haywire. Some missed important office meetings, while others feared that they might fail to make it to their personal events like weddings and convocations. Further, a few passengers were forced to reschedule their medical appointments such as for cancer treatment.
A group of Ayyappa devotees travelling said their flight to Kochi was delayed by five hours and there was no confirmation from the airline as to when their flight would take off.
“Since there is no clarity when the flight would take off, we planned to go by road. People would not have suffered this much if the Central government and the airline had coordinated on the issue,” said D. Srinivas Rao.
Two Hyderabad students – P. Kumar and Om Sai - who were supposed to attend their convocation in Amity University, Noida, said they were waiting since the morning. “We have to reach the university by December 7 and are worried if they do not operate flights we will miss the moment,” they said.
Suman Agarwal attended a wedding in Jaipur and was on his way to Bengaluru when she got stranded at Hyderabad. She said people waited for long hours to book tickets in other airlines but the fares were very high.
With the protests inside the airport due to cancellations the airport staff allowed only passengers with the confirmed scheduled flights inside.
Rajendra Babu of Bengaluru said, “Airline staff told me that a flight will be available only tomorrow. When I asked for the confirmation, the staff said that they cannot guarantee it.”
Tripti Sharma from Uttar Pradesh said, “We have a one year old kid and suffered a lot at Chennai airport due to delay. They provided an alternative flight and we noticed that half of the aircraft was empty while outside people were struggling to reach their destination.” She said her baggage was left behind in Chennai and customer care was not responding. “We have planned to stay in Hyderabad at a friend’s place until the things get normalised,” she added.
Officials at the airport said they anticipated 85,000 passengers but around 47,000 travelled on Friday. Around 88,000 travellers were expected on Saturday, they said.
The RGIA handles an average of 190 departures and 190 arrivals of IndiGO flights daily. As many as 236 flights out 380 could be operated on Saturday, they added.
Patients Travelling for Medical Treatment Worst-hit Due To Flight Cancellation
Passengers travelling for medical treatment were among the worst-hit due to the IndiGo airline flight disruptions. Next in line were those who were passing via Hyderabad to other destinations.
Jyothi Jalani, who came from Jaipur to Hyderabad for her husband’s eye surgery, said their flight on December 4 morning was cancelled, and they were asked to return on December 5. “Both the flights got cancelled,” she said.
“Travelling between the hotel and airport is causing stress to my husband, who is in need of rest after surgery. So, we have planned to drive to Jaipur by road. If we had known this earlier, we would have booked train tickets,” she said.
Miheeka, a passenger from Indore, was supposed to reach Kochi via Hyderabad by Thursday for her father’s cancer surgery but was stranded.
She said, “My father has to undergo many tests before surgery. Given the situation, we left him at the hotel and reached the airport for the enquiry about the flight status.”
Miheeka said their baggage has also not been returned and all medical reports and medicines were in it and without them they cannot proceed for the treatment.
Rajendar Dhima from Chandigarh said, “Our flight was scheduled on Thursday to our destination. We went on a vacation to Kochi and after reaching Hyderabad we were informed that the flight was cancelled. We were assured of accommodation but no one reached us to help”.
He said staff kept saying senior officials would come and resolve the issue but no one turned up. “We are waiting for three days. They now said the flight is confirmed for Sunday. We were not even provided drinking water after charging thousands of rupees for tickets,” he added.
