Racism in homeland!

Jasmine Singh

Jatinder Shah, popular music director of the Punjabi film industry, doesn’t need to refresh his memory to come up with the details of the bad day; the bitterness is still fresh in his heart and mind too. On April 3, on his flight back to Mumbai from Chandigarh, Jatinder Shah was abused and assaulted by the pilot of Jet Airways. Jatinder’s friend, Pooja Singh Gujral who was accompanying him, was physically assaulted by the same pilot. 

 Even though, the incident was reported by Jatinder Shah, but it grabbed headlines only when cricketer, Harbhajan Singh tweeted about this from his twitter handle. 

Bhajji tweeted- So called this Bernd Hoesslin a pilot with @jetairways called my fellow indian(u bloody indian get out of my flight)while he is earning here.

He later followed it with another tweet- Not only was he racist but physically assaulted a lady and abused a physically challenged man..absolutely disgraceful &shame on @jetairways

Almost 24 days after the incident, Jatinder Shah finally saw some action being taken. 

“I am still under shock,” he goes on to briefly explain what took place that day. “I always travel with my own electronic wheelchair, which is battery operated. That day, when the flight landed in Mumbai, I asked the cabin crew to give me my chair, because I am immobile without it. The crew told me that they had sent it to conveyor belt. After much persistence, they asked me to wait on my seat, and after good 45 minutes they gave me my chair,” Jatinder Shah doesn’t want to be interrupted. 

While Jatinder Shah was fixing the battery of his wheelchair, the pilot came out from his cockpit and started yelling at him. “He yelled, what the hell you are doing here. To which, my friend Pooja and I explained that it was because of the delay in providing the chair that they were leaving now. The pilot then physically assaulted Pooja, and threatened to harm us. When he was going back, he shouted bloody Indians go away.” 

Untoward incidents on air flights is not new, but for Jatinder Shah who is a regular flyer, this was something he hadn’t ever thought of. “The Jet authorities made such a lame excuse. They requested me to calm down, and wanted me to understand that the pilot was a gora, and goras talk like this.” 

Harbhajan tagged the Prime Minister and Jet Airways in his tweet, and it was then that everyone started noticing it. 

On a lighter note, Jatinder will not give up flying, neither does he have anything personal against any airline. Asi azaad han, shouldn’t we raise our voice against this bad behaviour? Wasn’t the comment racial? Even in our own country, should we be taking such abuses?” questions the music director.

The pilot was derostered after being accused of racism by Harbhajan Singh.