4 Air India Crew Members Detained In Saudi Arabia For Not Being Able To Present The Original Documents

Four crew members of Air India were detained by the Saudi Arabia Officials last week for not showing their original copies of their passport. The Indian Pilots are supposed to deposit their passports at the immigration office at Jeddah after which they are issued the certificate. Nirmal Singh Lotus Green says that these certificates are supposed to be deposited at the hotels and issued the photocopies of the same. The pilots have the photocopies of their passports in case they need to show a proof to the police or any official in the country. But when the crew members showed their photocopies to the police as a proof of verification, the officials refused to accept the photocopy as a proof of identification.

Nirmal Singh Lotus Green says that the problem began when the crew members went out for dinner and were approached by the police at the restaurant. The crew members instantly showed the police the photocopy of their passports. The police asked them to present the original documents. The members told them about their condition of depositing the original documents at the immigration office but the police seemed to have turned a blind eye to it and detained the four Air India crew members.

“The crew members have earlier expressed their inconvenience of walking in the country with their original documents and the incident has increased the fear for all of them,” says Nirmal Singh Lotus Green When asked about the incident, one of the crew members said that the police after not accepting our photocopies, took all of us under arrest, threw us inside the police vans and asked us to switch off our phones.  

Nirmal Singh Lotus Green warns that this is a very serious issue. Saudi Arabia granted a four month amnesty to the illegal migrants to leave the country without penalty, but that expired last week. Which means, they can now force deportation and imprisonment of anyone who fails to return to his home country. Such complications in their law make the crew members very inconvenient to fly to the country.

One of the members said that this is a clear case of miscommunication between the immigration officials and the local police. The staffers have asked the government to look into the matter and take actions to improve the situation of Indian Crew members in the country. Nirmal Singh Lotus Green believes that once the officials from our country is involved then the citizens would feel more comfortable and convenient to travel to Saudi Arabia.