NEW DELHI: National passenger carrier on Saturday denied reports of a lizard being found in the food tray of a passenger on board its New Delhi-London flight. The airline has termed it a "hoax" to tarnish its image.

"This incident never happened. As there is no record of it, no complained that was filed either in London, New Delhi or on-board the flight. No cabin crew or even the other passengers on the flight are even aware of such an incident and no one has come forward to complaint even now," a senior Air India official in New Delhi told IANS.

A city-bound Air India flight was grounded at Mumbai airport today by the aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) after it found that the crucial engineering documents relating to the plane were not updated.

This forced Air India to replace the aircraft, leading to a delayed departure of the city-bound flight from Mumbai via Aurangabad, sources said.

NEW DELHI: A cabin crew member of an Air India flight was detained by the Jeddah Airport authorities on charges of smuggling out gold.

The detained cabin crew was to board the flight bound for Kochi, along with 11 other crew members, sources said here tonight.

Government carrier Air India said it will not buy five Boeing 787-9 aircraft anymore. The decision to stick to the original model of inducting Boeing Dreamliner (787-8) aircraft was taken at a board meeting held recently. The 787-9 variant has a longer flying range and 40 more seats over the 787-8.

Air India, which has 20 Dreamliners, had signed a deal in 2005 to acquire 68 Boeings, including 27 787s. At present, it uses both narrow-body Airbus A320 and wide-body Boeing 747-400s, 777s and 787-8 on international routes.

The ministry of finance has not accepted a proposal by Air India to treat Rs 4,300 crore of the government’s equity infusion into the airline as a grant or income so as to prop up the bottom line of the carrier. “The finance ministry hasn’t favourably considered the request from Air India,” a senior Air India official told FE.

FE had earlier reported that the Rs 4,300 crore equity received by Air India, as part of the government’s infusion in accordance to the Turn Around Plan (TAP), will be used to fund the interest cost. Therefore, Air India executives want to treat this equity infusion as an income in the airline’s balancesheet.

NEW DELHI: Cracking the whip on errant employees to improve on time performance (OTP), Air India (AI) has suspended 17 air hostesses for allegedly delaying flights.

The airline has started monitoring when each of its crew reports to airports to operate flights. "These 17 cabin crew members were found to have delayed flights more than three times and they have been suspended," said an AI official.

NEW DELHI: The Tata Group has virtually ruled out re-acquiring Air India when the government decides to divest in it.

"That was 14 years ago (when Tatas were keen on buying back AI.) Not now," Tata Sons-Singapore Airlines (SIA) JV Vistara chairman Prasad Menon told TOI.

BHUBANESWAR: A Delhi-Bhubaneswar Air India flight (AI 873) made an emergency landing at Lucknow airport with 169 passengers onboard at about 12.30 pm on Tuesday. All the passengers were safe after the landing.

Airport sources here said that there was minor crack in the windshield forcing the pilot to land at Lucknow airport. The flight left Delhi at 11.30 am and was to land in Bhubaneswar at 1.15 pm.

Low-cost carrier Air Asia India has decided to go slow with its fleet expansion due to lack of clarity on international flying rules. It has also deferred its one-plane-per-month fleet expansion plan, and plans to end the year with 7-10 planes from the present five.

"We slowed down in adding one plane a month plan. I took the call of watching and waiting," airline's chief executive Mittu Chandilya told PTI, and blamed the decision to the lack of clarity on overseas flying rights for new airlines.

A stringent psychological test for pilots in the wake of the Germanwings disaster has led Air India to reject nearly a third of the prospective candidates.

The airline might find it difficult to fill posts for senior trainee pilots for Airbus A320 aircraft.

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