Commerce Minister Anand Sharma had some anxious moments mid-air on Wednesday after smoke was detected in the British Airways flight from Budapest to London.
The plane had an emergency landing at Dusseldorf in Germany where all the passengers were evacuated safely and sent to their respective destinations by a Lufthansa flight.
According to officials in the minister's office, the British Airways flight, which took off from Budapest, noticed mid-air smoke emanating from one of the engines.
"In the mid-air between Hungary and London, smoke engulfed the engines of the plane due to which the plane had to be diverted and perform emergency landing at Dusseldorf, Germany," an official statement said in New Delhi on Thursday.
"We apologise to passengers on flight BA 869, Budapest to Heathrow (London) which diverted to Dusseldorf this afternoon as a precautionary measure due to a technical problem," British Airways said in a statement
Sharma boarded the flight after attending Indo-Hungary Joint Commission on Economic Cooperation meeting. He was heading to London to attend the India-UK Joint Economic Trade Committee meeting.