Jet Airways aircraft at Chattrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai. Photo / Getty Images
Jet Airways aircraft at Chattrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai. Photo / Getty Images
An Indian court sentenced a business-class passenger to life in jail after he was found guilty of placing a hijacking note in a toilet of a flight, the first such ruling under a new law.
Birju Kishor Salla, 38, was also fined US$720,000, which will be distributed among pilots, crewand passengers, a special court of the National Investigation Agency said in a judgment.
The passenger, who was flying on a Jet Airways India flight to New Delhi from Mumbai in 2017, was found guilty of intentionally disrupting the operations of an aircraft on board.
"Flight No. 9W 339 is covered by hijackers and aircraft should not be land and flown straight to POK," Salla wrote in a note placed in a tissue paper box, according to court filings.
POK refers to the part of the disputed state of Kashmir that's administrated by Pakistan. Salla further vowed to start killing people if the aircraft's landing gear was deployed, according to the documents.
A platinum member of Jet Airways's loyalty program and a jeweller by profession, Salla may have wanted to ground the airline to woo a flight attendant, who he hoped would then approach him for job, the Times of India newspaper reported without saying where it got the information.
The flight's pilots will get over US$1400 each from the fine, while every passenger on board will pocket $360, according to the verdict. Crew members will get US$720.
India in 2016 amended rules, making the death penalty compulsory if a hijack attempt results in the death of a hostage or security personnel.
In Salla's case, the pilot managed to land in the western airport of Ahmedabad and no passenger or crew was harmed.
- Bloomberg
A special #NIA court here on Tuesday awarded life imprisonment to a Mumbai-based businessman and imposed a fine of Rs 5 crore on him for leaving a #hijack threat note on a #JetAirways plane in October 2017. https://t.co/b89rdi4mtR
