Kuwait Airways and Indian Airlines have been ordered by a Delhi consumer court to pay Rs 10,000 each to passengers in separate cases for denying seats to them despite their having confirmed tickets.

"A person, holding a confirmed ticket cannot be denied a boarding pass, and if denied it amounts to deficiency of service," the New Delhi District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum held in a recent order and directed Indian Airlines to pay Rs 10,000 to an affected IAS officer.

Rejecting Indian Airlines' contention that the complainant had reached late at the checking counter on Nov 11, 1999, it said: "This plea is not tenable as there is no rule in which a confirmed passenger could be denied a boarding pass if he has reported within the stipulated time."

In another case, the consumer court, noting that Kuwait Airways had denied seats to an Indian passenger and his wife on the ground that their tickets were not 'reconfirmed' 72 hours before their departure, asked the international airliner to pay a similar amount as compensation and litigation costs.

On the stipulation that 'the ticket must be reconfirmed at least 72 hours prior to departure,' the consumer court said the words 'at least' do not denote that tickets should be reconfirmed only 72 hours before departure and not earlier than that.

The complainants, M P Gupta and his wife, had purchased the tickets in March 1998 from New York to New Delhi via Kuwait for Aug 1998 and had got them reconfirmed twice on September 25 and 28, 1998, respectively, it said.

Kuwait Airways was also directed to return $1,050 dollars, the amount charged to them for accommodating them in the business class on Oct 10, 1998.

Gupta and his wife said when they approached Kuwait Airways for their journey to New Delhi at JFK Airport in New York, they were told that their tickets stood cancelled as they had not got them reconfirmed 72 hours before departure.

The couple alleged that they were charged $1,050 more by the international airliner to accommodate them in the flight in business class as their tickets were originally booked for economy class.

Forum president L C Jain, members Janak Juneja and R Narayana rejected the argument of Kuwait Airways that there was no deficiency of service on their part as the complainants themselves insisted that they be provided seats in the commercial class, which was given by charging $1,050.

In the Indian Airlines' case, the complainant, Alok Sinha, who was a zonal manager of the Food Corporation of India, said he had a confirmed ticket in the Lucknow-NewDelhi flight which was scheduled to depart at 10.20 am.

Sinha alleged that he had gone to the airport at 9 a.m. for reporting well in time for the flight but the officials of the domestic airliner refused to give him a boarding pass for that flight and he got stranded despite having a confirmed ticket.

The consumer court noted that Indian Airlines had not submitted that there was any particular time on which the complainant had to report to obtain the boarding pass except that Sinha reached late at the checking counter.