A few days ago we received numerous requests on the tip line that we cover the story of the Northwest Airlines plane that returned to Amsterdam airport soon after taking off for Mumbai. If none of us posted on it at that moment, it’s probably because we were waiting to see what came of the incident. Not surprisingly, we now learn that it was a false alarm:
The Dutch ambassador to India has expressed regret for the arrest of 12 passengers whose India-bound plane was diverted to Amsterdam after their behavior triggered fears of a hijacking, a government minister said on Friday.
The 12 men, all Muslims, were, however, cleared of any wrongdoing and released and their families said they were victims of racial discrimination.
The case of the 27-year-old Canadian radiology resident thrown off a United Airlines flight was also a false alarm:
A Winnipeg doctor is demanding an official apology and compensation from United Airlines after being kicked off a flight in the U.S. this week, an incident he has characterized as “institutionalized discrimination.” Dr. Ahmed Farooq, a Muslim, was escorted off an airplane in Denver on Tuesday. According to Farooq, reciting his evening prayers was interpreted by one passenger as an activity that was suspicious.
The Washington Post has a good round-up article of these and similar events today. In it I learned of this excellent new acronym (perhaps not so new to those of you in the UK): TWA. Most appropriately, the initials of a late lamented airline now stand for “Traveling While Asian” — a little like Driving While Black (DWB) only with higher stakes and more exotic rewards.
Now I know some commenters will point out that so long as groups of young Middle Eastern men have the market on airborne mass murder cornered, there is some rationale behind profiling; but perhaps we can all agree that botched, panic-driven and vigilante-led profiling is, like, a general bummer. Exhibit A:
Farooq said the allegation came from a passenger who appeared drunk and had previously threatened him during the trip. …
Farooq said that even officials from the Transportation Security Administration soon realized the flight crew had overreacted, but by the time that conclusion had been reached the trio were forced to stay in Denver for the night and catch a flight the next day — at their own expense.
The gentlemen on the Amsterdam-Mumbai flight were deemed suspicious because they were fiddling with mobile phones and chatting loudly around the time of take-off. Uh, excuse me? Anyone here ever traveled in the Third World? People being loud and fiddling with cellphones is suspicious? More to the point, what about travel in the civilized West? Every khaki-clad, buttoned-down, yellow-tied Joe from sales and Tim from marketing (not to mention Ashok from strategic planning) is futzing with his phone until the moment wheels leave the ground and again from the instant they touch down.
Now comes the news that the Monarch Airlines Costa del Sol fiasco may — just may — have been… a prank. (Thanks Jai for the tip.) IF — and it’s still a big if, so let’s not jump to conclusions here — IF Messrs. Ashraf and Zeb were trying to prove a point, it’s not clear they have been helpful to their cause. It’s one thing to stage a guerrilla theater event to reveal a little-discussed injustice, but it’s another when every few days a dead-serious case like the ones mentioned above comes to light.
In the meantime, my macacas and macacis, stay away from aviation if you possibly can. Personally, I’ve stopped traveling to any place I can’t get to by the Chinatown bus.
Never experienced any issues myself, but I’m not sure where whining about the racism of “the man” is going to get anybody. The very act of migration to the United States is an implicit acceptance of some degree of subjugation to pervasive white supremacy. You either live it, or you buy an airline and/or try to take over the government.
Gujudude, Mace Windu? That will make my snakes inedible won’t it? I like tomato sauce with my snakes. What about my kesh? Should I carry lots of kesh or only my credir cards?
“Anyone here ever traveled in the Third World?”
Third world. Whats that?. It is as racial to me as “Welcome to America” means to you. Since me being from India. I was researching and found the term “Third world” was coined by one of our racist friends from France. I don’t know how much i can believe a wiki post. But I am pretty sure to tell everyone it stings me in the right places. Developing world sounds nice to me. Since India is not stagnating anymore, i really like that word. We are not a colony anymore, so please lets not use that word.
Hasn’t history and experience taught us by now that terrorists ALWAYS sit apart from from each other in order to avoid arousing suspicion? But what does it matter when people feel so afwaid?
If this is what sets off the irrational fears of passengers, we may as well all be dead. I’m sure the real terrorists are loving this diversion. What an easy job they have!
kxb @ comment 30: got no iron-y? 🙂 That said, yes, I would be mad as hell if I got detained for 24 hours for no good reason, subsequent apology or no apology. Where is my Kafka when I need him…
Well, I scanned the newspaper again. The headline on page 3 says that the other passengers thought that the troublemakers were “more annoying than terrorist”. Anyway the common line the article seems to be taking is that these people were merely causing disturbance.
That’s right, folks: you should be arrested and jailed, and your plane should be escorted by F-frigging-16’s, if you talk on cellphones and are uncouth in your social manners. Glad we were able to clarify that.
In December of 2001, when I was about to board a flight from LAX to Malaysia, two gentlemen dressed in navy blue suits and sunglasses (I kid you not) swooped out of nowhere and demanded for my passport and travel documentation. In the midst of rushing to board a plane, I hadn’t realized that these were probably FBI operatives, and the sleek move with which they sidestepped me completely caught me off by surprise. I wasn’t harassed, but it seemed as though they were “looking” for something wrong. During the entire ordeal, I was more concerned about getting to my plane on time. The fact they sort of begrudgingly let me off only struck me as strange much later.
On board, about an hour’s away from landing in Sepang, Kuala Lumpur Int., enlightenment dawned on my bare horizon that I hadn’t freshened my facehole during the entire 16 hour trip, mostly due to ruminating on the incident at LAX. Panicking that my parents were going to greet their son with the funkiest breath imaginable, I jumped out of my seat, reached into the overhead compartment, dragged out my carry-on, rummaged through it hysterically, muttering under my breath for my freaking travel kit. When I looked up after finding what I was frantically looking for, I was greeted by inexplicably horrified stares by he entire economy class. God knows what played through their minds, but something hinted along the lines of the most macabre kind. I smiled, apologized for startling their delicate, conceited sensibilities, just because brown boy with fro and goatee here forgot to brush his teeth. The thing is, had a white dude, with a fro and goatee, done the same thing, it probably would have been brushed off as eccentric behavior, but by virtue of being brown, my erratic movements were subverted into the most corrosive ones possible. Just a personal experience I thought I would share.
Where is my Kafka when I need him…
Probably sitting alongside some Dutch cartoonists.
“Well, I scanned the newspaper again. The headline on page 3 says that the other passengers thought that the troublemakers were “more annoying than terrorist”. Anyway the common line the article seems to be taking is that these people were merely causing disturbance.”
Ah yes my dear Meena. These natives can indeed be very annoying. For one they eat spicy food and this gives them an animalistic sexual urge. They also do not engage in proper hygiene. Indeed the ways of soap and water are unknown to them.
My, my the good old days of the Raj, my heart yearns for them so.
Didn’t you know that I suffer from Stockholm Syndrome?
The thing is, had a white dude, with a fro and goatee, done the same thing, it probably would have been brushed off as eccentric behavior
Uh – dude, Richard Reid (white dude, bearded, but no fro) was jumped on by passengers and later was arrested in December 2001 for trying to light his shoe.
The only thing white about Richard Reid was his name. KXB your facts are as reliable as your logic is sound.
“Didn’t you know that I suffer from Stockholm Syndrome?”
Really my dear? What is it that endears a genteel lady like yourself to the natives? I hope you lead them to enlightenment like Annie Besant and others before you.
Slightly off topic, there was an interesting program on Channel 13 in New York yesterday about the troubles faced by the Sikh community in New York post 9/11, clip here and rerun on August 29th.
While Reid is half-Jamaican, I doubt that was obvious to anyone sitting next to him
And let’s not forget about this Iraqi (haven’t they suffered enough) brother trying to get on a plane at JFK:
“How come you are asking me to change my t-shirt? Isn’t this my constitutional right to wear it? I am ready to change it if you tell me why I should. Do you have an order against Arabic t-shirts? Is there such a law against Arabic script?” so inspector Harris answered “you can’t wear a t-shirt with Arabic script and come to an airport. It is like wearing a t-shirt that reads “I am a robber” and going to a bank”.
Unbelievable. Get the full story here.
KXB.
Nice post. Ironically, Indians from India have been more understanding about the whole affair. See this and this. I don’t think we should get all defensive and treat this as a racial thing. As you have speculated, other Indians must’ve complained. See this pic of other passengers in the plane. DNA India confirms: “According to officials of the Dutch justice ministry, the 12 Mumbai-born Indians had not done anything seriously wrong but added their behaviour and exchange of mobile phones had aroused suspicion – a fact confirmed by fellow passengers.”They were moving about and talking loudly. They were exchanging cell phones and laptops all that give rise to suspicion,” said Kiran Dalal, a passenger of the Northwest Airlines flight who arrived in Mumbai on Thursday night. “Some passengers were frightened by their behaviour,” she added.”
The Mumbai Mirror article has this gem of a sentence by a relative of one of the 12. “All 12 have known each other for long, so they might have been making mischief on the flight, but that wasn’t reason enough to pick them up,” Kolsawala said. Lubna Kolsawala, 25[..]” and in a separate article: “Abdul Aziz, father of the young Suhail Abdul Nijani, 21, who recently entered into the family owned garment business and is the youngest of the 12 detained, said, “He is very playful by nature and must have indulged in some innocent prank which must not have gone down well with authorities. In the wake of the bomb blasts even the rustling of a paper is viewed suspiciously.”
KXB I have proved my point about your facts being as shaky as your logic. I really don’t see the need to debate you on the “white appearance” of Mr Reid. I rest my case.
Do me a favour love, and spin that question 180 degrees, at least you’d be getting somewhere then. 🙂
KXB I have proved my point about your facts being as shaky as your logic. I really don’t see the need to debate you on the “white appearance” of Mr Reid. I rest my case.
Cauvery made the point that if were a white guy engaging in the same behavior, he would not arouse the same position. I simply pointed out that the same month and year he was experiencing glares over Malaysia, Reid was getting jumped on and injected with sedatives over the Atlantic. And before the other passengers did this, I doubt they determined Reid’s ethnic makeup to determine what level of force they should use in subduing him.
white authorities should leave minorities 100% alone until the next 9/11 at which point it was 100% the authorities fault for not catching the warning signs.
Along with being a total bummer, I think it also deadens our instincts. I am a firm believer of trusting-your-gut. But you can’t be clogging that stuff with prejudices, because then all you accomplish is being afraid all the time. We begin to look for middle-eastern men, instead of keeping an eye out for genuinely odd behavior.
That wasn’t the point I was trying to make. Read a few posts in this thread where this was discussed. Terrorists like to fly under the radar and won’t do anything to garner attention until they act.
Most people, that includes browns, whites, whoever, don’t know this. Any kind of abberational behavior sets of insecurities. It isn’t out of blantant racism as much as simply being insecure and misinformed. So, anything that I can do to avoid being spotlighted upon, I will. That doesn’t mean I’m gonna bleach my skin or scrub off my browness, become white, and put on a NASCAR cap. It simply means I’ll be tactful and mindful of my surroundings and ensure I flow through the system.
Being hysterical when flying is the worst thing anyone can do. Being defensive and hysterical only adds to the potent mixture.
A quote from one of my favorite books:
Yes, I am an uber geek. I’ve got fears, others do, and fundamentally its all about self preservation. I’ve got a long way to go in learning and self discipline as to most of us. Airports is one place where such discipline would come in handy as it is a focal point of different people, security, attacks, etc.
sonia: Well said. Malcolm Gladwell would agree!
Though this incident turned out to be a false alarm, it is now easy to criticise the authorities for overreacting. Don’t forget the James Woods incident…
Nice post. Ironically, Indians from India have been more understanding about the whole affair.
This is what I was saying early on – that since Indians experience terrorism more frequently than Westerners do(not just jihadist, but Naxalite and various seccessionist movements as well), they understand sometimes there is a mistake made. Of course, mistakes by Indian authorities (such as those “police encounters”) are often irreversible. Pakistani human rights activist Asma Jehangir had her New Delhi hotel room searched by police, for which PM Singh later apologized. So, here we had brown on brown suspicion. It ain’t just a white thing.
James Woods is a genius (quite literally). Most of the airport-wallahs are not. And Sonia, your point is excellently observed and expressed. Don’t clog up your instincts with your prejudices. Essactly.
But damn, there’s a lot of hysterical self-hating macacas up in this joint. “I’ll take of my shorts, I’ll spread my buttcheeks, I’ll do anything you want as long as you don’t humiliate me.” Shoot. Nobody needs to humiliate you when you’re doing a fine job by yourself.
Bredren and sistren, stand up for your rights!
More on the story:”Among others on board the ill-fated flight was Central Industrial Security Force Deputy Commandant (Retd) Umesh Prasad Behera.
Behera says the air marshals did what they ought to have done. The group of 12 passengers was not heeding the instructions of the stewardesses, who had asked them to switch off their mobile phones and to remain seated. As their pleas fell on deaf ears, the stewardesses had to alert the air marshal, Behera said.
“As an educated passenger I had asked them not to use the lavatory while the plane was taking off, but they did not listen,” he said.
The air marshal tactfully used sign language to call out the erring passengers so as not to create panic among the other 148 passengers on board the aircraft, he added. “
On the other hand, there is no dearth of genuine idiots even in the US. Heh 🙂
But damn, there’s a lot of hysterical self-hating macacas up in this joint. “I’ll take of my shorts, I’ll spread my buttcheeks, I’ll do anything you want as long as you don’t humiliate me.” Shoot. Nobody needs to humiliate you when you’re doing a fine job by yourself.
So, not using your cellphones in-flight is the same as getting a hand up your butt? Again, everyone else heeded instructions, no phones and no getting up and around – these 12 did not. The rest of the plane was not asked to spread their buttcheeks.
Bredren and sistren, stand up for your rights!
What rights would those be – the ones conferred by the Dutch government, the Indian government,or the IATA? Or are we extending the US Constitution overseas now?
Luckily in real life, I am surrounded by brown folks who are in full possession of their sanity.
Enough alerady with ‘macaca’, unless you want the label to stick for a long time to come.
Enough alerady with ‘macaca’, unless you want the label to stick for a long time to come.
Agreed – it’s as stupid as black folks calling each other nigger. Just because that redneck (by way of sunny southern California) Allen coined it, I don’t want to have to see it used everyday, even in jest.
Iknow this is wrong, but if I was on a plane and heard a group of Muslims praying on it, I would kind of freak out. My thought process would go something like this
And to make it clear, if I heard anyone praying on a plane, no matter what religion, it would freak me out.
It could be the Dhali Lama and I would tell him to keep it down your freaking me out.
When this story had just broken… and all I’d heard was “flight out of Amsterdam” and “12(?!) passengers going nuts”… my first thought was “Somebody must have said the wrong thing bout the wrong soccer team”…
Please tell me honestly – Wouldn’t it be better, if the authorirites issued different colored passports/ids to Muslims. Heck, shouldn’t they ask passengers to declare their religion when gong through security checks.
p.s. and tad unrelated American embassy officios, at least in Delhi, have started asking young visa applicant their religion. However, in most cases this doesn’t preclude anyone from being approved.
Lawd have mercy. They’re crawling out of the woodwork today.
Lots of stuff is crawling out of the woodwork today.
This is turning into to some kind of fad…
Somethin amiss from the 12 angry Indian men story. Why are passing around their cellphones? Are ALL of them playing at the same time? Did the airlines make some kind of weak story and trying to get away with it? Why are ALL of them muslim men? Were they all related to each other, or was it just a good old fun trip organized by muslim youth club in India to Amsterdam.
More importantly, did they any fun in Amsterdam? 😉
Sorry to cut and paste this article but it summarizes what some have said on this post – our Indian brothers need to learn some basic flying manners. It was wrong for Dutch authorities to detain them for as many hours as they did but I hope this teaches people a lesson about flying etiquette and following instructions.
From TOI – ‘Indians are unruly fliers’
MUMBAI: While the debate rages on whether the 12 Indian detained by the Dutch police on Wednesday were victims of racial profiling, flight attendants feel Indian passengers habitually ignore instructions of the cabin crew while on board.
An Indian Airlines attendant who flies on the Kolkata-Bangkok sector says, “These so-called educated passengers do not switch off their cell phones when they are asked to do so, and still make calls when the plane is ready for take off or is landing. Before the plane halts, they jump up from their seats and open the baggage. They ignore the ‘seat belt on’ signs. It’s really tiring to attend to such passengers.”
Referring to the North West Airlines flight in which the Indian passengers apparently refused to follow instructions of the crew, the attendant said, “If we were to follow such strict rules in India, then every flight would have to make emergency landing.”
Unlike the NorthWest Airlines crew, emergency landings are frowned upon in India. The duty of the cabin crew to keep an eagle eye on passenger’s behaviour is almost taken for granted.
Explaining the predicament, an Airhostess says, “Even if we are forced to enforce the rules because of such passengers, we are not supposed to leave our seats until we are instructed by the captain.”
According to cabin crews, first-time flyers and couriers are the ones who are mostly to blame. “As these passengers fly frequently, they are often upgraded to the better section under the frequent-flyer programme. They spend the duration of the flight moving up and down the plane to be with colleagues in the Economy Class which causes a lot of confusion inside the aircraft,” feels one of the cabin crews.
Crew members also complain about passengers behaving badly after a couple of drinks on sectors like Bangkok, which have a free-bar service.
An NRI who travelled by North West from Amsterdam to Mumbai earlier this year, said though he thought the behaviour of the flight crew in this week’s incident “smacked of racial discrimination”, Indian passengers often behaved inappropriately.
He recalled an earlier flight in which on landing at the Mumbai airport, even before the ‘seat belt on’ sign was put up, most Indian passengers had unbuckled their belts and sprung from their seats. “Their cell phones had begun to ring when they were supposed to keep them switched off. Only after the airhostess sternly told them that no one would be allowed to get down did they obey her instructions.”
In stark contrast, an airhostess who flies in the international sector, says, “Foreigners and NRIs are totally different in international airways. They even ask for permission to listen to music on their personal electronic devices. In fact, we might be losing some good travellers. We have come across passengers who have appreciated our services but have told us they would never to fly our airline because of unruly co-passengers who are a nuisance.”
Also, due to intense competition, airlines often have to put up with badly behaved passengers. An airline pilot can offload an unruly passenger, but he refrains from doing so because a rival pilot may not take similar action.
However, say flight attendants, if all airlines begin to take strict action against disobedient passengers, it would go a long way in creating better flying conditions. They suggest the Ministry of Civil Aviation and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation should consider such a proposal.
apparently they were part of a business delegation attending a trade show in the carribean. They were from the same community in bombay
How many of you have seen a live antaskhari session in Flight?
ha ha..I’ve been a part of one. IIRC, my team won. This was during a domestic flight in India…Sahara I guess. Even the air-hostess sang a couple of songs!
I understand that victim status is a powerful unifier, but I really hope most Americans of Indian descent aren’t as happy to play the victim as some of the people on this thread. America really doesn’t need to be fractured any more along ethnic victimhood lines, it’s already at the breaking point. Buck up, everyone. Thanks.
Antakshari! See this is the kind of shit that drives me nuts in India (and Europe). If a bunch of people decide to have a good time, then they don’t care about the people who do not want to participate and they will get really noisy. Whether it’s the antakshari crowd, or the Sabari Mala crowd on a train, or just a large family…if the numbers are big enough, that’s license to be unruly.
This is much rarer here, but it does happen. Last night, I was on a train that passed through Anaheim and a bunch of Angels and Red Sox fans came on board headed for San Diego. They started chugging beers and generally making a lot of noise, every now and then stomping so hard that the compartment shook. And this was from 10pm to midnight! Most people had been trying to sleep until that point. Every single one of the fans was white. If that had been a bunch of desis returning for a wedding or bhangra night, they would have been reported for suspicious activity for just an tenth of that noise and the train would probably have been met by cops at the next station where they would be led off in handcuffs.
Bryant,
Welcome to the Mutiny, and thanks for your message for those desis who might be citizens of a “moderately corrupt republic” (in Czeslaw MiloszÂ’s words), i.e., USA (I am assuming you were using America to refer to USA). That said, I would like to know which of the opinions expressed here have taken the tone of victim-hood, and how?
Further, FYI, the Mutiny from what I understand of it, and have seen so far, attracts a global audience, and covers desi-centric topics which are global in scope. So bracketing the pro and con opinions here by nationality may not work that well, as they may have been written by “aliens” etc.
I havent seen one (and I am FOB). But what I have seen once in Air India flight to India (my first and last) people smoking in the plane inspite of warnings written on the plane and inspite of the message from the Caption and the crew.
This utter lack of respect for the rule of law is unacceptable to me while I am flying. Thats why I stopped flying Air India. (Well, the fact that their planes are dirty and its impossible to go to the rest room because it smells so bad, could be equally important reasons 🙂 )