Emergency exit row: Co-passenger Annamalai says Tejasvi Surya ‘accidentally touched’ door, condemns Congress
Chennai: After BJP MP Tejasvi Surya was accused of opening the emergency exit of an IndiGo aircraft sans authorisation at the Chennai Airport, BJP Tamil Nadu unit chief K Annamalai broke his silence on Thursday. Annamalai, who was seated beside Tejasvi Surya on the said flight on December 10 claimed that his party colleague did nothing wrong.
Annamalai said Tejasvi could have “accidentally touched” the emergency door during an effort to adjust the AC valve. After they saw the emergency door was “slightly disturbed from the position”, they quickly alerted the crew and the passengers were deboarded, he said.
“When Tejasvi was adjusting the AC valve, his hand could have accidentally touched the emergency door. He also asked me to take a look to see if the emergency door was open. I also saw the emergency door was slightly disturbed from the position,” Annamalai said.
“We informed the crew about the issue and the air hostess conveyed the same to the pilot. They came and asked what exactly happened and Tejasvi explained,” he added.
The flight’s pilot summoned an engineer and initiated the standard procedure to be followed. Thus, all passengers were deboarded and the cabin was pressurised, the BJP leader said.
Explaining how the incident snowballed into a controversy, Annamalai said certain members of the DMK and Congress were at the airport when the incident happened. “I didn’t expect Congress would go stoop to this level. As a usual procedure, IndiGo wanted an incident report form. Tejasvi also apologized to everyone for any kind of inconvenience caused as the plane was delayed,” he said.
Annamalai said they reserved the seats by the emergency door as he prefers to fly in seats with comfortable leg space. If the airlines had any doubts about Tejasvi, the procedures would have been different, he added.
“There is no question of somebody opening the door. If somebody has opened the door like that, the punishment is FIR and deboarding. In this case, IndiGo itself has felt this is an accident. I was sitting next to him, I can vouch for it,” Annamalai concluded.
Quoting an eyewitness, a news report had earlier said that Karnataka BJP MP Tejasvi Surya had opened the emergency exit door of the flight preparing to take off. He was made to apologise, the eyewitness claimed.
The incident reportedly took place when the cabin crew was briefing the passengers on the safety protocols. The BJP MP who was also listening to the mandatory emergency procedures “pulled the lever causing the opening of the emergency exit”, said the report.
Following the incident, all the passengers were made to deboard the plane and were asked to sit on a bus.
The incident caused Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) officials and airline authorities to rush to the spot. The plane finally took off after a two-hour delay. Citing IndiGo sources, the report further said that Tejasvi Surya was asked to apologise and he gave it in writing.
