A family's pain has been prolonged as they wait to say goodbye to their baby son due to the extraordinary airline disruptions throughout India.
For the last three days, the body of 23-year-old Saptarshi Das from Ramnagar in Agartala has been kept at a Delhi mortuary. On the evening of December 3, Saptarshi, a medical intern at a private hospital in Lucknow, perished in a collision on the Delhi-Lucknow national highway.
The catastrophe also claimed the lives of his friends Shrestha Pancholi, Ayush Sharma, and Arnav Chakraborty. Their vehicle struck a stalled truck at a high speed, causing it to overturn.
After an examination, Saptarshi's body was given to his family to be sent to Agartala for the final ceremonies. However, IndiGo's abrupt flight cancellation resulted in an annoying cycle of returning the body to the mortuary, making hotel reservations, and looking for other choices.
Arpita Debsarkar, Saptarshi's mother, claimed that after her family was repeatedly assured of flights, they were abruptly canceled and had to travel back and forth between the morgue, hotel, and airport.
With only three months remaining, Saptarshi's MBBS internship at Venkateshwar Medical University was almost over, according to his mother.
The flight disruptions continue to cause chaos at Maharaja Bir Bikram Airport in Agartala. Three planes have been canceled every day for the last two days alone, leaving hundreds of travelers including patients stranded at the airport lounge. Both IndiGo and the Airports Authority of India have been accused by irate travelers of neglecting their responsibilities.
