November 23, 2007	Friday	Ziqa’ad 12, 1428

PARIS, Nov 22: A Frenchman who weighs 170 kilograms (375 pounds) has won a court case against Air France after it made him buy a second seat on a flight from New Delhi to Paris, he told AFP.

Jean-Jacques Jauffret, a 43-year-old screen-writer, said he was deeply humiliated when airline staff measured his girth with wrapping tape in front of other passengers at New Delhi airport.

Air France was ordered to pay 8,000 euros (11,800 dollars) in damages and to reimburse the cost of his second seat, in a ruling delivered last Friday.

Returning to France from a holiday in India in August 2005, Jauffret was told that as the plane was full he could not be assured a free seat next to him. Instead he was told to buy the extra ticket.

“The court recognised the humiliation I suffered. Now Air France is going to have to say clearly what is its commercial policy. Does it carry people or kilos?” he said. —AFP