NEW DELHI: The Delhi Police on Saturday arrested Shankar Mishra, the man who allegedly peed on a co-passenger on board an Air India flight, in Bengaluru and brought him to the national capital. Later in the day, a Delhi court remanded him in judicial custody for 14 days, saying no police custody was required though the Delhi Police sought three-day custody.
“Just because there’s public pressure, don’t do this. Go by the law,” the court said, when the police claimed they needed his custody to get him identified by three cabin crew, two pilots and some co-passengers.
On November 26, Mishra, on board Air India flight AI 102 from New York to Delhi, in an inebriated state, allegedly urinated on an elderly woman. After it became public over a month later, the Delhi Police registered an FIR under various sections of the IPC and the Aircraft Rules Act at the IGI airport police station.
Soon after, Mishra switched off his mobile phone and went incommunicado. Two police teams were constituted to find the accused. While one of them camped in Bengaluru, the other one was in Mumbai where it raided multiple possible locations to ferret out Mishra. He was finally traced to Bengaluru on Friday night and brought to Delhi early Saturday.
In the FIR accessed by this newspaper, the woman stated her clothes, shoes and bags were soaked in urine but the Air India crew refused to touch them but sprayed her bag and shoes with disinfectant.
“My clothes, shoes and bag were soaked in urine. The bag contained my passport, travel documents and currency. The flight staff refused to touch them, sprayed my bag and shoes with disinfectant, and took me to the bathroom and gave me a set of airline pyjamas and socks,” the woman said in her complaint. She then asked the staff to change her seat, but was told no other seats were available.
“The flight crew told me that the pilot vetoed giving me a seat in first class. After I was standing for 20 minutes, one of the senior flight staff offered me the small crew seat, where I sat for about two hours. I was then asked to return to the initial soiled seat. The seat was still damp and reeking of urine,” she said.
The 70-year-old was then given the steward’s seat. While she insisted on his arrest, the crew told her that he wanted to apologise. “I stated clearly that I did not want to interact with him... However, the crew brought the offender before me against my wishes,” the FIR read.