News

Volume 9 Issue 7 - June 15, 2012

D.R.G. member resigns from Ministry of Civil Aviation Committee

D.N.I.S. News Network, India: Shivani Gupta, nominated by Disabled Rights Group (D.R.G.) to the Ministry of Civil Aviation Committee drafting a new set of guidelines for carriage of passengers with disabilities, has resigned citing disagreement on the process and the lackadaisical attitude being adopted towards the continuing discrimination by airlines. Incidentally, one of the much publicised incident where the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Disability was humiliated happened in an Indigo flight, which is a member of the said Committee.

Gupta said that while it is important to review the existing Civil Aviation Requirements (C.A.R.) on carriage of persons with disabilities, the Ministry should take at least some steps, even if they are small, to implement the existing C.A.R. to stop harassment at the ground level. The Ministry seems to be buying time and pacifying the sector’s anger with the Committee without any definite commitment to stop such gross violations, she said in her letter.

The last straw, according to Gupta was the violation at the hands of Indigo, which happens to be a member of this Committee. “If being part of the Committee is so meaningless then why have it in the first place,” she stated.

“There are countless unreported cases that happen on a daily basis. Today each time I want to travel by air, I am actually scared of what treatment I may receive even though I am a member of this ‘distinguished Committee’. It is unethical for me to sit on a Committee while no change is happening on the ground,” Gupta added.