'Bro, I Think I'm in Trouble': What Shankar Mishra Told Co-passenger After Peeing on Woman in Flight

Shankar Mishra, the man accused of peeing on a female co-passenger in her 70s, on an Air India flight from New York to New Delhi on November 26 last year, was allegedly inebriated and told another co-flyer that he might be in trouble after the incident took place.

Sugata Bhattacharjee, a US-based doctor of audiology, was travelling in the same flight with Mishra and was seated in 8A (window) in the first row of business class, next to Mishra in seat 8C. He recounted the entire incident in an interview with Times of India. “He was an unruly drunk passenger. He downed four glasses of single malt whisky, during lunch alone,” he said.

The doctor conjectured that Mishra must have had more alcohol before and after because he looked “visibly drunk”. Bhattacharjee said, “After he asked me the same question thrice — ‘What do your children do?’ — I walked up to a male purser and told him my co-passenger was intoxicated and they should cut off the alcohol supply.”

Mishra allegedly urinated on a passenger seated behind them in seat 9A. While Bhattacharjee was asleep when the incident occurred, he recalled what took place after. “We were in row 1 in the business class cabin. The lavatory was four rows behind. I still cannot understand the rationale… He (Mishra) woke up, went to the next row and urinated,” he said. “There was a woman in the aisle seat too, but it was the window seat woman passenger who was drenched in urine.”

“Though she was visibly distraught, the cabin crew coaxed her to speak to the man who had urinated on her,” he said. “A drunk guy is a drunk guy is a drunk guy. When you see a guy who has done a crime like this, you don’t bring him to the victim to allow him to apologise to her.”

After the incident, Mishra allegedly dozed off. “After a while Mishra woke up, he had sobered up a bit and told me, ‘Bro, I think I am in trouble’. I said, ‘Yes, you are’” said Bhattacharjee.

While Bhattacharjee praised two cabin crew members who helped the woman clean up, saying that “they went beyond their call of duty”, he claimed that the crew did not acknowledge his complaint on the handling of the situation overall.

“Towards the end of the flight, I asked the crew for a complaint book to note down my protest against their handling of the situation. But they gave me a piece of paper and asked me to write on it. The airline did not even acknowledge its receipt.”

The two-page complaint note said, “I woke up mid-flight when my co-passenger Shankar Mishra (8C) fell on me. I initially thought he had lost his balance due to the rough flight.”

“However, as I was going to the restroom, I saw my two fellow passengers in 9A and 9C in distress. When the lady of 9A came to the galley area, I saw she was all wet and we were shocked to realise that my co-passenger (8C) was so intoxicated that he had gone to the next row and urinated on her. I was there the whole time when the two air hostesses diligently helped her clean up, change her clothes and sanitized her belongings and seat,” the note read, as per Times of India.

“I personally am bothered by the fact that the Captain waited for close to two hours before allotting her a fresh seat. When you have four first class seats vacant, you don’t make a distressed passenger go back to her seat (soiled one) and wait for a crew seat to be vacant to move her. This is a poor judgement call by the Captain” the note read.

“I have been flying Air India for decades now. I absolutely love Air India. I am passionate about India’s national carrier. I was born in the northeast of India, they were our go-to airline. Nobody gives you connectivity the way Air India does. But in the end, it’s all about taking accountability,” Bhattacharjee said.

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