Highlights:
- Scoot Airline flight that was previously scheduled to leave the Amritsar Airport at 7.55 p.m. took off at 3 p.m., several hours before that time.
- All passengers were notified of the change in timing by email, said the airline.
- A similar incident happened earlier this month, a Go First flight with a destination of Delhi departed from the airport in Bengaluru without boarding 55 passengers.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has ordered an investigation into how a flight from Amritsar to Singapore took off hours ahead of schedule, leaving 35 passengers behind.
The investigation was started by the aviation regulatory authorities after a Scoot Airline flight that was initially scheduled to leave the Amritsar Airport at 7.55 p.m. on Wednesday took off at 3 p.m., hours before its planned departure time. As a result, there was an uproar at the airport, and those who had been left behind protested. They filed a complaint with the authorities at the airport.
When airport authorities contacted airline officials, they learned that the passengers had received an e-mail informing them of the change in flight schedule.
According to the director of the Amritsar airport, over 30 passengers were left behind when 253 passengers were rescheduled to fly to Singapore instead of the expected 280 passengers.
The Amritsar Airport authority and Scoot Airline, a Singaporean low-cost carrier and fully-owned subsidiary of Singapore Airlines, have both been asked for more information by the DGCA. All passengers were notified of the change in timing via email, the airline said.
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According to an airport official who spoke to ANI, the travel agent who purchased tickets for a group of 30 people failed to inform them (the passengers) of the change in flight timings, and as a result, the airline only took the passengers who arrived on time.
A similar incident involving a Go First flight leaving behind 55 passengers who were travelling to the flight via shuttle bus was recently reported from Bengaluru airport.
The delayed passengers were reportedly accommodated on a different flight four hours later.
The Chief Operation Officer of Go First Airlines was sent a show-cause notice by the DDCA asking them to provide justification for not taking enforcement action against the airline for failing to uphold regulatory obligations.
