E-Paper
Passengers see red over long queues at Pune airport conveyor belt
Despite several complaints on social media and even with the Airport Authority of India (AAI), there hasn’t been much of a change in the situation, say passengers
Passengers flying in and out of Pune are an irate lot. Reason being waiting for long at the conveyor belt both during departure check-in and arrival has become an everyday occurrence for them. The latest passenger on the receiving end is Saurabh Dugad who on Tuesday morning at Pune airport complained about the delay in the luggage checking-in process. “Hello Air India, not that I want to disturb your busy schedule of not showing up on time but we are kind of waiting to get our bags checked-in at Pune airport at 5.50 am for a 7.30 am flight. See if you can spare some time for us.”
Another passenger, Siddharth Kabra, took to Twitter to vent his frustration. “Long line at Pune airport for baggage screening for IndiGo. Progress?”. A female passenger on condition of anonymity said, “Queue for baggage drop at IndiGo 6E flight counter at Pune airport. Not sure why we have to suffer this.”
Passengers have repeatedly complained about waiting in long queues and the luggage check-in process being delayed by hours in the last few weeks, especially due to the festive season. Despite several complaints on social media and even with the Airport Authority of India (AAI), there hasn’t been much of a change in the situation. Passengers are furious over the delays, the heavy rush, over 170 flight operations daily, and nearly 12,000 passenger footfalls during the festive season notwithstanding.
In a similar incident last week on October 29, Tanay Kumar Sil, a passenger flying out of Pune airport posted, “Bad management at Pune airport security check. Neither proper queue management nor conveyor management for baggage check-in. Waste of time and effort for both security personnel and citizens.”
Another passenger Shivraj Dalvi on October 28 posted on his Twitter handle, “Just flew SpiceJet DXB PNQ SG52 on October 27 from Pune airport, which was a mess. Bags came out late, damaged my bag, and also the lock was removed. There were a lot of other passengers. Bags came to the belt almost 30 minutes late. You need to investigate this. Never seen so many issues with my favourite airline.”
Whereas Santosh Doke, Pune airport director, said, “During the Diwali festival, there was a heavy rush of passengers travelling from Pune airport as we had touched daily flight operations of 85 each for departure and arrival, and passengers too were more than 12,000. There are continuous efforts to provide better facilities at the airport; we had even opened up the security hold area (SHA) to clear the extra rush of passengers during the last two weeks. Still, we will be looking into the issues related to luggage check-in and arrival.”
