Here's what happened.
An IIT professor Devasmita Charaverty took to Twitter to narrate an incident wherein a woman was shifted from her seat on an IndiGo plane because she could only speak Telegu. In the flight from Vijayawada to Hyderabad, a woman on the plane was shifted from the exit row to the one behind it, accoring to the Twitter user.
Chakraverty said, “a woman….was forced to seat 3C because she understood only Telugu, not English/Hindi. The attendant said it's a security issue".
See the tweet here
Some users pointed out to Chakraverty that the plane's crew has to be able to communicate with exit row passengers .The crew can decide to shift someone who they believe won't be able to assist in an emergency situation.
A netizen wrote," While I am against Hindi imposition but here I don’t think it’s a discrimination issue. The crew needs to be able to communicate with those sitting in the emergency row in the unfortunate event of an emergency. Many times people are shifted if the crew feels they aren’t capable of handling an emergency situation or also if they are unwilling to operate the emergency exit. The discretion is the crew’s since they are best suited to determine safety measures that would impact all passengers"
To this another user pointed out, "Shouldn’t they ask the appropriate questions before they sell specific seats? We forget we are paying extra for these!"
The narrative caught the attention of Telangana minister KTR who suggested a ‘win-win solution’. He said, “Dear @IndiGo6E Management, I request you to start respecting local languages & passengers who may not be well conversant in English or Hindi. In regional routes, recruit more staff who can speak the local language like Telugu, Tamil, Kannada etc. This will be a win-win solution"
Other Twitter users also expressed anger over the incident.
"Considering that both Vijayawada and Hyderabad are in Telugu states it's incredulous/unacceptable that @IndiGo6E (sic) has no announcements in Telugu nor have flight attendants who can't speak the language," a user named C Ramana Kumar wrote. "Clearly Hindi Imposition and discrimination against non-Hindi language."
Another comment read: "If it's a safety issue, why didn't you recruit a staff who knows regional language (sic)?"
The language debate remains a contentious one in India, with certain incidents reigniting the discussion. One such incident took place in 2020 when DMK leader Kanimozhi revealed that a security official at an airport had asked her if she was Indian, after she said she did not know Hindi.
