Dear Colleagues,
Please refer to my earlier post on an incident wherein disability rights activist Jeeja Ghosh who was forcibly deplaned from a Goa-bound SpiceJet flight from Kolkatta in February because the pilot felt she was unfit to fly. On Jeeja's petition, honorable Supreme Court of India has issued notices to the Union Government, Airliner and the DGCA.
A bench of Justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana P Desai issued notices to the Union government, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and SpiceJet on her petition accusing the private airline of subjecting her to traumatic treatment on February 19 and depriving the organizers of her expertise during the international seminar.
"Jeeja Ghosh has experienced similar experience before. In 2008, she was forced to undergo a medical examination before being allowed to board an Indigo flight from New Delhi to Kolkata," the petitioner said and sought an investigation into the incident.
"These acts of discrimination which have left disabled people very upset have continued unabated despite the enactment by the Central Government of clear and binding directives prohibiting discrimination against disabled persons in air transport," said Jeeja.
She requested the apex court to direct "SpiceJet to adequately compensate the petitioner for loss of money, wasted time and the humiliation and trauma suffered during the unsavoury incident".
This case coupled with the uproar in the disability sector has pushed the Government of India/ DGCA too hard to take a swift action against the Airliner and if required amend the Regulations to include penalty clauses, if need be.
The result has been several meetings with the stakeholders and now constitution of another committee to suggest changes in the existing CAR to make it more inclusive and give it more teeth.We hope this would not be another lip service and another rule book to meet defiance rather than implementation that we see with the existing CAR.
The story has been covered by
(a) The Times of India: Cerebral palsy afflicted woman moves Supreme Court, demnads compensation from SpiceJet
(b) The Hindu : Court Notice to Centre, DGCA on deplaning of disabled
(c) The Indian Express: SC notice to SpiceJet for deplaning woman
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