A Russian model and actor, Evgenia Belskaia, who was on the Delhi-Goa flight with her team when the co-pilot was attacked by an unruly passenger on Sunday, said the passengers were livid due to the 13-hour delay and partly blamed the captain for aggravating the situation.

In a video posted online, Evgenia Belskaia said, of course, hitting the pilot was wrong but the passengers were very angry and nervous due to the long delay.

A passenger, Sahil Katariya, on the IndiGo flight number 6E 2175, between Delhi and Goa, was arrested after he assaulted the co-pilot, Anup Kumar, and when he was announcing a delay in takeoff at the Delhi airport, the police said on Monday.

In a purported video, which has gone viral on social media, Sahil Katariya, a resident of Delhi’s Amar Colony, can be seen hitting Anup Kumar as he was announcing the flight. According to flight tracking website flightradar24, the IndiGo flight took off from Delhi at 6pm after a delay of more than 10 hours.

Sharing the video clip on Instagram, Evgenia Belskaia wrote, “My team was waiting 10 hours for their flight then one guy got fed up and after this they had to wait 3 more hours! Police took the guy and they had to change pilot also! Crazy really!”

While condemning the assault, the actor said, “The pilot came and said you are asking too many questions and we missed our turn because of this… The pilot blamed the passengers for the delay.”

Belsakaia said she was flying her team to Goa from Delhi and had reached the airport early to board the flight, which was scheduled to take off at 7:40am. “The IndiGo team was saying that the flight had been delayed by an hour. It went on for at least 10 hours until we were allowed to board the plane,” she said.

Belsakaia added that after boarding the flight, the passengers were told that the flight had been delayed by two hours. “The passengers were angry and started asking questions from the crew and the pilot,” she said.

Belsakaia admitted that while it was wrong to hit the pilot, she also questioned the pilot for blaming the passengers for the delay. “Everyone was nervous and instead of supporting them you made it worse,” she added.

The incident took place on a day when dense fog majorly impacted operations at the Delhi airport leading to many flights being diverted, cancelled or delayed.

Civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said reacted sharply and said “unruly passenger behaviour is unacceptable” and “will be dealt with strongly” in line with existing legal provisions.

Scindia also said the Director General of Civil Aviation will issue an SOP OR standard operating procedure for airlines on better communication and facilitation of passengers to minimise discomfort in view of flight cancellations and delays due to poor weather conditions.

Later, the DGCA issued an SOP, instructing all scheduled airlines to comply with it regarding flight delays and cancellations.

As per the SOP, airlines shall be required to publish accurate real-time information regarding delays of their flights on the respective website of the airline and provide advance information to affected passengers by SMS, WhatsApp and email. It also said in view of the prevalent fog season and adverse weather conditions, airlines may cancel, sufficiently in advance, such flights that are anticipated to be delayed or consequentially delayed on account of such conditions beyond a period of 3 hours with a view to obviate congestion at the airport and mitigate passenger inconvenience.

In a statement, IndiGo Airlines said Kataria, who has a toy business, “assaulted” the co-pilot and that the matter had been referred to an independent internal committee for his inclusion in the “no-fly list”.

In the short video clip of the incident inside the aircraft, other crew members could be seen shouting at Kataria, in a yellow jacket, after he hit the pilot.

Kataria can be heard saying, “Chalana hai to chala, warna gate khol” (fly if you want to, otherwise open the gate).

In another video clip, that too went viral, Kataria was seen being taken out of the aircraft by security personnel even as he apologised for his conduct.

The accused was then taken to a police station where he was arrested but later released on bail.

A case under sections 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), 341 (punishment for wrongful restraint) and 290 (punishment for creating public nuisance) of the IPC and section 22 of the Aircraft Rules has been registered against the passenger and investigation taken up, another police officer said.