A viral video on social media revealed a passenger‘s “nightmare” first class experience on Air Indiaafter finding torn furniture, dirt around his seat and a broken in-flight entertainment system.
Entrepreneur Anip Patel posted a video on September 17 in which he describes his flight from Chicago Unpleasant Delhi on an Air India flight in his first class seat that cost $6,300.
What he found when he boarded the plane for his 15-hour non-stop flight was that the cabin was in “poor condition,” with “unclean seats, food and trash still in the cabin, and everything looked worn or broken.”
Patel described it as “the worst first class cabin I have ever been in” and showed bits of dirt and hair in the “filthy” electrical socket compartment.
“There was stuff moving around in every compartment; everything was torn, broken, moldy. I understand normal wear and tear, but this was next level,” Patel said in the video.
He also took close-ups of stains and cracks in the cabin’s furniture, adding that “everything was broken” and that tape had been used to keep everything in place.
Patel was also offered a pair of headphones for his seat, but once he opened the headphones, he said they were untangled and had mold on them.
Patel also claimed that there was no Wi-Fi in the cabin and that the in-flight entertainment system was not working despite the flight attendant trying to restart the system four or five times.
Patel said he had been “living hard” the entire 15-hour flight without internet access or entertainment.
The passenger also showed a clip of the on-board menu, which he said initially looked “promising” but later revealed that 30 percent of the food items were unavailable, he claimed.
Although there were only four passengers in first class, he said the lack of food meant that the menu was served on a first-come, first-served basis.
Despite the issues he had with the menu, Patel admitted that the soup he was given was delicious and the “only good thing on board”, and that the pyjamas and skin care products provided were decent.
After he posted the footage from his first-class flight with Air India, the video went viral on social media and was viewed millions of times across platforms.
Patel later added that after the video became popular online, Air India refunded him the full amount for his first class seat.
“I didn’t file a complaint with Air India but they saw this video on social media. They called me today and refunded my entire flight. They made it right and that’s worth mentioning,” he wrote.
Patel’s video was posted online on the same day that Air India announced it would refurbish 67 planes in its fleet worth $400 million.
The upgrade includes new seats, carpets, curtains and upholstery on the 27 narrow-body Airbust A320neo aircraft, followed by the 40 wide-body Boeing aircraft.
The Independent has contacted Air India for comment.
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