With United Airlies recently being in the news for physically dragging a paying passenger off a plane to accommodate their staff, reader Gulserene Dastur shared on Facebook an anecdote about her father Nari, who served as head of reservations for Air India in Bombay in 1949-50.
An early Air-India plane Photo: skyscrapercity.com; Nari Dastur
At that time, planes had 25 seats, and he had to deal with an overbooked flight as a junior reservation officer. He caught sight of an Englishman who "looked to be what he described as an NCO (non-commissioned officer) type wearing flannels.” Nari walked up to him......