'Broken seats, filthy floor': Tata-owned Air India flyers share images of 'endless horror'

Flyer Sahil Sharma shared visuals of a "filthy" lavatory on an Air India flight. (Image credit: @sahiltinnu/Twitter)

Air India flyers have been taking to Twitter to share their grievances with the airline, and although the phenomenon isn't uncommon, photos of the poorly-maintained flights have gone viral on social media, raising concerns among flyers who pay a bomb for the tickets.

On Monday, the editor of news agency ANI, Smita Prakash, tweeted photos of an Air India flight that her cousin took to fly from Delhi to San Francisco. The business class had 11 broken seats so she and nine other passengers were downgraded to economy class. The flight, Prakash tweeted, had malfunctioning seats, filthy floors which forced two flyers to off board without being refunded for their tickets.

Prakash termed the flight an "endless horror".

A cousin flew @airindiain last night SFO Delhi. Paid business class full fare, 11 seats broken in business, so she & 9 others downgraded to economy, 2 chose to off board, no refund. Last row, non reclining, also malfunctioning seats, filthy floor, endless horror. pic.twitter.com/dwRw7eoc0B

— Smita Prakash (@smitaprakash) October 17, 2022

She further added that Air India also downgraded her on a connecting flight without any explanation. "Not only is Air India not refunding her for downgrading her on this sector, they even downgraded her on the connection to Bengaluru. No explanation other than, yup your ticket is valid, we have no seats, you can choose to not fly, no refund," Prakash tweeted.

Not only is @airindiain not refunding her for downgrading her on this sector, they even downgraded her on the connection to Bengaluru. No explanation other than, yup your ticket is valid, we have no seats, you can choose to not fly, no refund. pic.twitter.com/0YjTQEQg4K — Smita Prakash (@smitaprakash) October 17, 2022

Air India, however, responded to Prakash's tweets and apologised for the experience.

"Dear Ms. Prakash, we're sorry to know about your cousin's overall experience with us. Believe us we never want our passengers to have this kind of experience. Please confirm the ticket details via DM. Let us pass it on to the concerned team for necessary review," the airline tweeted.

As Prakash's tweets went viral, other flyers too began to share their complaints of flying Air India.

Nothing was working on this flight. The lavatories were filthy, and the entertainment system was down, call buttons were not working, in fact nothing was working on the DEL-SFO flight which cost a bomb. I emailed and didn't get any satisfactory reply until now. pic.twitter.com/nvviHF99Ha

— Sahil Sharma (@sahiltinnu) October 17, 2022

Similar thing happened with us on @airindiain Mumbai - London flight .. pathetic service.. never expected this from @airindiain — shalu sharma (@shalu131221) October 18, 2022

@airindiain AI-174 and AI-184 has the oldest fleet of the aircraft. Most of the seats are broken.Almost none of the display screen works.I haven't seen any issue with the crew behavior though.The food is good too. The aircraft needs immediate replacement. Hurting country's image

— Stonker (@SeaStonker) October 17, 2022

Air India has responded to most of the complaints made on Twitter, promising to look into the incidents and convey the messages to the relevant teams for "necessary review and action."

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