Airline in ‘cash for fuel’ scandal files for bankruptcy
The Birmingham-India charter airline that was accused of forcing passengers to chip in to buy fuel to complete their flight has filed for bankruptcy.
Austrian-registered Comtel-Air, majority-owned by Indian businessman Bhupinder Kandra, has debts of 1.2 million euros, according to the Austrian creditors' protection agency KSV.
More than 180 passengers on a chartered Comtel Air flight from Amritsar in north India to Birmingham were stranded on the tarmac in Vienna during a refuelling stop after being told the airline "ran out of cash to fund the last leg of the trip".
Passengers said the airline threatened to remove their luggage from the plane if they did not find the £20,000 needed to complete the flight.
The passengers, who refused to get off the plane in a six-hour stand-off, were finally escorted by police to ATMs to draw money.
According to a report in The Age, the airline denied passengers were asked to pay for the fuel, but in a video filmed by a passenger on board they can be heard getting told "if you want to get to Birmingham, you have to pay".
The airline blamed travel agents for the situation, saying it had not passed on money.
A few days after the reports emerged, Essex-based travel company Astonbury Ltd, trading as Skyjet, ceased trading.
The company sold flights to Amritsar in India from Birmingham on Comtel.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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