Principal secy forgets passport home; CM refuses to leave without him; flight had 250 passengers on board
Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis is not one to live life king-size. But for more than an hour on Tuesday, he lived life Maharaja-size. Or, more than Maharaja-size.
In the wee hours of Monday, Fadnavis boarded a Newark-bound Air India flight from Mumbai, with a delegation in tow. But principal secretary in the Chief Minister's office Pravin Pardeshi was missing. Airline officials had stopped Pardeshi from boarding AI 191 as he had forgot to carry along his visa- stamped old passport.
If you ask how Pardeshi managed to clear security and immigration clearances and reached till the step-ladder, sources tell us the immigration department realised about his visa and the passport only later.
Since it would have taken a lot of time for Pardeshi to get the visa-stamped passport, airline officials reportedly advised the CM to carry on, with Pardeshi following him in the next flight.
But Fadnavis refused to travel without his delegation, and the flight got delayed by more than an hour, said sources.
Since the delegation was holding up the flight, the airline even started the process of off-loading their baggage. But before they could complete it Pardeshi's passport arrived.
Eventually, the flight took off after more than an hour with Pardeshi. One of his relatives carried the passport to the airport, and he was allowed to board the aircraft.
The Ahmedabad-Mumbai-Newark flight had left Ahmedabad at 10:45 pm and was scheduled to leave Mumbai at 1:30 am.
Sources confirmed to dna that the flight left Mumbai well after an hour. But Air India officials put the delay at 57 minutes, and the civil aviation ministry at 10 minutes. Air India cited technical glitch as the cause and the ministry blamed lack of parking space.
"The flight – AI 191 – of Monday was delayed by 57 minutes. The delay was partly due to technical /operational reasons and also due to the ATC," said an airline official.
Minister of state (civil aviation) Mahesh Sharma told media in New Delhi that the delay was only for 10 minutes and it was primarily due to the unavailability of parking space.
Ravikiran Deshmukh, Chief Minister's media advisor, said that he is unaware about the issue as he was not able to get in touch with the CM or his delegation as their phones were switched off.
Later, the chief minister himself reacted to the incident. "The allegation that I forced to delay the flight to New York is false & misleading. I totally deny it," he tweeted.
Fadnavis is on a week-long official trip to the US, where he is scheduled to hold a series of meetings with trade and industry captains, including those of Microsoft, General Motors, Google, Amazon and Citibank. The delegation includes Industries Minister Subhash Desai, Chief Secretary Swadheen Kshtriya, Pravin Pardeshi and others.
Interestingly, few months back Air India management had proposed a law, wherein, if any flight gets delayed the crew members of officials responsible for the delay will have to pay the fine for it. The fine was to be deducted from his/her's salary after an investigation.
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