Jet Airways denies boarding on ‘fake’ ticket

A 36-year-old biotechnologist who was to fly from Mumbai to Nagpur was denied boarding by Jet Airways barely half-an-hour before the flight. The airline told the woman that she possessed a fake ticket and boarding pass that had been hacked from the account of one of their frequent flyers. They told her to get a letter from the frequent flyer and denied her boarding.

Surprisingly, the woman, one Pooja Sainani, who was to fly business class on Jet Airways flight 9W 7133 Mumbai-Nagpur in the afternoon of July 8, had booked a ticket online and on the Jet Airways website, the ticket had showed up as “confirmed”. When approached by this newspaper, the airline refused to comment on the issue.

Ms Sainani was in the city for the past three months to attend a course in make-up and hair-style and was staying at her father Ashok Sainani’s place in Sion. Mr Sainani, an actor by profession, told The Asian Age: “In the evening of July 6, one of my friends booked a Jet Airways ticket to Nagpur for Pooja and sent it to us. Upon receiving the ticket, I checked on the Jet Airways website where its PNR appeared as ‘confirmed’”. He added that as Ms Sainani had successfully checked-in through the airline website, no boarding pass was required at the counter. Also, she was only carrying cabin baggage and so, went directly to the waiting area after passing security check and showed her boarding pass there. Later, when the airline started the boarding process, they saw her pass and denied her boarding saying her PNR and ticket were fake. Airline staff stamped a cancellation mark on her ticket and unceremoniously told her to return.

“My daughter was humiliated so badly that she was not in any frame of mind to talk to anyone,” claimed Mr Sainani. “If it was indeed a fake ticket, how in the first place did it appear as confirmed on the website,” he questioned.