Maltreatment of passengers

THESE days airports are considered the face of any country and catalyst for promotion of tourism, whilst being key to national and international trade relations. This is why major countries around the world especially those in the Gulf have been seen investing heavily in the aviation sector which has definitely accrued economic benefits for them.
It is however unfortunate that our airports not only lag behind the international standards but the staff deputed there is also not well trained to handle the passengers. A few days back, Airport Security Force personnel manhandled a few passengers at Islamabad International Airport. The incident happened on 17 October when a Pakistan International Airlines flight from Saudi Arabia to Peshawar was diverted to Islamabad due to bad weather. After landing at the airport, the passengers had to wait for several hours due to bad weather which led to their protest. The quarrel between passengers and the ASF staff started when the latter made an attempt to stop the protesters from leaving the airport lounge as some of the passengers wanted to reach Peshawar by road. Whatever the reason and even if the passengers were at fault, the airport staff should not have gone mad to maltreat the passengers. This really shows the lack of capability and training of the airport staff to better deal with such passengers. It is good to see that Prime Minister Imran Khan personally took notice of the incident and ordered suspension of the officials including the airport manager under the rules. He also directed the Civil Aviation Authority Director General to initiate disciplinary proceedings against them for not dealing with the situation in a professional manner. To avert such embarrassing incidents in future which only distort the country’s image abroad, it is important that the concerned officials are properly penalized after the investigation. At the same time it is also important that before induction, the airport staff, including those in the national flag carrier PIA, are given training as per the modern trends as to how they should maintain composure while dealing with especially the distressed or aggressive travellers.