Air India passenger finds metal blade in on-flight meal

Air India on Monday confirmed that a passenger had found a foreign object in a meal served on one of its flights, last week.

Chief Customer Experience Officer in Air India, Rajesh Dogra informed that the object came from a vegetable processing machine used by its catering partner, reported news agency ANI.

Dogra said that the company has asked its catering partner to strengthen the system in place for checking processing and chopping of vegetables in order to prevent any such incident from recurring in future.

"Air India confirms that a foreign object was found in the meal of a guest aboard one of our flights. After investigation, it has been identified as coming from the vegetable processing machine used at the facilities of our catering partner. We have worked with our catering partner to strengthen measures to prevent any recurrence, including more frequent checking of the processor especially after chopping of any hard vegetable," said Dogra.

A week earlier, a passenger, Mathures Paul, had complained on X that a blade was found in his on-flight meal. Paul highlighted that although he escaped getting harmed by the metal blade, it could have caused major problems to a child.

"Air India food can cut like a knife. Hiding in its roasted sweet potato and fig chaat was a metal piece that looked like a blade. I got a feel of it only after chewing the grub for a few seconds. Thankfully, no harm was done. Of course, the blame squarely lies with Air India's catering service but the incident doesn't help the image I have of Air India. What if the metal piece was in the food served to a child?," wrote Paul on X.

"First picture shows the metal piece that I spat out and the second picture shows the meal before it put metal into my life. @airindia," he added.