Air India — Wheelchair mishandling by the ground staffs.

Address:	Bangalore, Karnataka, 560059
Website:	www.isibang.ac.in

I was traveling by AI 776 from Bangalore to Kolkata on 8th July 2009 (Etk:[protected]C1, Boarding No. 109) with my Otto Bock B 500 model (Made in Germany) power wheelchair (Tag No. AI313325 [protected]), which is designed for international air travel without removing the batteries (batteries are dry cell and sealed, do not need any maintenance). Being a faculty member of a Government of India funded educational institute I travel only by Air India and quite frequently. I have been traveling with this wheelchair by AI since 2012. I am based in Bangalore. However, this time the handling of my chair by the ground staffs (led by one whose first name starts with Priya and last name starts with P, wearing black coat). They didn't have any idea about how to security check this chair. When I tried to guide them from my experience how to get the wheelchair scanned in which big X-ray machine in the Bangalore air port they completely ignored me and made unnecessarily move from upstairs back to down stairs while boarding already started. When I assured them I had disconnected the batteries, they completely ignored me and forcibly tried to remove a cable, which could have seriously damaged the chair on which I am so dependent that in case of a damage even my going to toilet will become impossible. All these years I have been taking the chair close to the air craft door and then transferring to an aisle wheelchair leaving behind my own chair to be loaded into the cargo hold. There have been no security objections from the CISF (even I have been allowed to do so in case of Lufthansa or United Air in Germany or in USA respectively without any problem). Only this time these AI ground staffs refused me that practice as if they have more security responsibility than the CISF, while CISF personnel were quite sensitive and cooperative to me. These 'over learned' ground staffs even didn't know that most of the airport buses are equipped with wheelchair ramp and insisted that I leave my wheelchair behind to take on the wheelchair provided by AI (which are far poorer quality than mine, more over I have 85% handicap and my wheelchair is custom made) before boarding the bus. This way at each and every step they made journey hell and delayed the boarding due to their inefficiency, stupidity and insensitivity. Please take them to task.

Dr. Kausik Kumar Majumdar
Associate Professor
Indian Statistical Institute, Bangalore Center
(An Institute of National Importance funded by Ministry of Statistics and Program Implementation, Government of India)
8th Mile, Mysore Road
Bangalore 560059
http://www.isibang.ac.in/~kaushik
[protected]@hotmail.com
[protected], [protected]