PIA offered a 30pc discount to travellers to spend Eid with their loved ones, a commendable marketing initiative. But would one really dare trusting them. I guess you can’t even imagine the misery and agony one has to go through in Ramazan when they delay the flight and the officials vanish from departure lounges.

The delay one can understand could be inevitable — technical fault, weather, or anything — but the PIA staff vanishing from the lounge and a private contractor asking you to show your boarding pass to collect a sandwich and a paper cup half full of tea is absurd.

Only recently one of my relatives had to stay at Dubai airport for hours when the airplane which was supposed to take them home ‘to celebrate Eid with loved ones’, developed a technical fault. This is no issue. But I was surprised when I read a spokesman comment in the press, saying these delays were planned owing to Ramazan timing, and passengers were informed a week earlier.

My relative was sitting at the airport. If it was a planned delay why was he even given a boarding pass? The first step to solving a problem is to realise that there is one.

Fareed A. Siddiqi

Karachi

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2015

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