Three flyers held after 'hijack' drama at IGI airport

2 Feb 2009,

NEW DELHI: The heightened hijack drill issued for airlines following the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack came into full effect

amid high drama on Sunday evening when three passengers, including a woman, behaved unusually aggressively on IndiGo

flight 6E 334 from Goa to Delhi.

Possibly inebriated, these passengers are learned to have told the airhostess that they were armed, had more accomplices in

the plane and that they had already put some flyers to sleep.

While this turned out to be just an empty threat, what followed was a complete hijack drill that led to panic among flyers

and major disruption of air traffic at IGI Airport for the next three hours.

When the threat was made, the plane was over Jaipur and had begun its descent for Delhi. The alarmed airhostess told the

pilot, who in turn sounded the alarm signal for Delhi ATC and landed at IGI at 5.29pm.

The Airbus A-320 with 163 passengers and six crew was parked at an isolated bay and was given a `follow-me' jeep. It was

promptly surrounded by security forced led by NSG and CISF.

According to sources, the three passengers were Jitendra Kumar Mohalla (16E), Samir Uppal (16B) and Harpreet Anand

(29D).

Other passengers on the IndiGo flight grew suspicious as the plane's doors did not open for over half-an-hour after landing.

They were told no parking bay was available. Most of them got to know about the `situation' only after they switched on

their mobiles and started getting frantic calls from relatives who had seen hijack news being flash on TV. The panic level

kept rising as more passengers kept getting informed they were ``hijacked and that someone was threatening to blow up the

plane''.

As soon as the plane landed, the committee of secretaries on anti-hijack, chaired by cabinet secretary K M Chandrashekar,

met to assess the situation. After drawing up a strategy, the aircraft door was opened at 7.52pm and five commandos sent

inside. During this time, other aircraft parked near this plane were not allowed to move. This led to passengers of many

incoming planes remaining inside for hours and others, who were in buses to board planes, being stuck on apron for a long

time.

It took another three hours for the IndiGo passengers to disembark the Airbus A-320. The three suspects were detained for

questioning and 20-odd flyers were being quizzed to get more information. Aviation secretary M M Nambiar said: “We

reviewed all aspects of the situation before deciding it was safe to allow passengers to disembark. The suspicious

passengers are being questioned.''

IndiGo CEO Aditya Ghosh said all passengers were safe and that deboarding had been completed by 10.30pm.
Passengers were allowed to disembark in batches of 20, after strict screening. The first passengers came out at 9.35pm.

Aruna Harprasad, a passenger, said: “We knew there was some problem in the aircraft with three passengers but everything

was vague. The crew kept reassuring us that all was well but we were getting increasingly suspicious.''

According to passengers, trouble started in Goa itself. West Delhi-based Jatin Anand, who was coming back from a

vacation in Goa with wife Bhavna, said: ``A passenger was seated next to the emergency exit and asked the airhostess to

change his seat. The airhostess was busy on take-off preparations and did not pay heed. Another passenger, seated across

the aisle in the same row, assured the flyer that the seat was fine. After take-off, the passenger who had intervened earlier

told a family that they should fasten the seatbelt around their infant in a particular manner.''