Rahul Gandhi flight scare: 'snag not uncommon’ says Aviation regulator
New Delhi: The plane taking Rahul Gandhi from Delhi to Hubballi on Thursday suddenly dipped, listed to one side and shuddered violently despite clear weather, the Congress has said in a complaint alleging "intentional tampering" of the aircraft and calling for an investigation. An FIR has been filed against the pilot.
The civil aviation regulator has blamed it on a "snag of autopilot mode", which, it asserts, is not uncommon.
"The operator has reported the incident to us. It was snag of autopilot mode and pilot shifted to manual mode and landed safely," said BS Bhullar, who heads the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
"Shutting of autopilot incidents are not uncommon. For any VIP flight, DGCA examines it in detail. We shall do here also," he added. A detailed report will be out in two weeks.
The Congress has called for a thorough investigation and this morning, there were a deluge of tweets from party leaders expressing concern.
In a letter to the Karnataka police, a party leader described the flight as "particularly frightening and uncommon" and said the entire experience had left the passengers "with a lot of anxiety and distress" and positively fearing for their lives".
Mr Gandhi's team member said in his letter that the "suspicious and faulty performance" of the aircraft was due to technical snags.
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Allahabad HC dismisses petition seeking permission to mount loudspeaker on mosque
Prayagraj, Jan 24 (PTI): The Allahabad High Court on Wednesday dismissed a writ petition seeking direction to the state authorities to permit the mounting of loudspeakers on a Masjid.
The court observed that the religious places were for offering prayers, therefore the use of loudspeakers was not a matter of right.
Dismissing the writ petition filed by Pilibhit-resident Mukhtiyar Ahmad, a two judge-bench, comprising Justice Ashwani Kumar Mishra and Justice Donadi Ramesh, observed, "Religious places are for offering prayers to the divinity and use of loudspeakers cannot be claimed as a matter of right, particularly when often such use of loudspeakers create nuisance for the residents".
At the outset, the state counsel objected to the maintainability of the writ on the grounds that the petitioner was neither a mutawalli, nor did the mosque belong to him.
The court also noted that the petitioner did not have locus to file the writ petition.
The term 'locus' is a legal concept that refers to the right of a person or entity to participate in a legal proceeding or bring a lawsuit.
