In the last entry to this blog, you may recall I was “stuck” in Thailand at the beginning of March due to Israel and America’s desire to start an illegal unprovoked war on Iran.
I was sitting on a connecting flight out of India on my way home from holiday around about the time the evil empire was murdering 185 children in a double-tap strike and my flight was cancelled. I spent the weekend on the floor of Delhi airport with the worst staff in the world before having to fly back to Thailand in the hope I could get a flight out in the next few weeks.
It was awful.
I then had to endure a further 10 days of Paradise after already having endured the best holiday I’d had in my life.
I was exhausted.
Well, the good news is – other than that I wasn’t an Iranian child, of course – that my reports of that incident went viral, and I finally made it back to Blighty 2 weeks later.
The bad news is I had to go through India again and security at Delhi airport stole my phone.
I had left my iPhone, a flagship model I’d only just finished paying for, on charge at the departure gate, and realised just as I boarded the plane back to Thailand.
The staff wouldn’t let me off the plane to get it, and wouldn’t let any ground staff bring it to me on the plane (having had to catch one of those little buses to board it). However, they did radio the crew at the gate who confirmed they had the phone in their possession.
They took my details and assured me they had the phone and I could pick it up in 10 days or so, when I finally caught a return flight home.
However, when I went to collect it at the airport 10 days later, I found that not to be the case at all.
Security had logged the phone as being in their possession, and took my details so it could be retrieved from lost and found. I had to give them my unlock code to do this, “in order to prove the phone was mine.”
When they went to collect the phone, the member of staff came back sweating, saying it “could not be found. It’s somewhere else” and I’d have to come back another time to collect it.
The whole process had taken almost 90 minutes, and there was now only minutes left to catch my departing flight, so I could not argue with them.
And I am damn sure they knew it.
The members of staff made a quick exit, and I was left with no choice but to accept I’d been played like a sucker and board my flight back to London.
No phone. No apology. No explanation.
My viral videos and the following article had ruffled the wrong Indian feathers, I guess.
Let’s be clear about what happened. A journalist landed at Delhi airport, having just published viral footage of the army responding to stranded passengers. He left his phone at a gate. Security confirmed they had it, took his unlock code when he went to retrieve it, and spent 90 minutes running down the clock before declaring it “somewhere else” – just as his connecting flight was about to leave.
Whether this was deliberate incompetence or targeted harassment is almost beside the point. The result is the same: a journalist is now without his primary recording device, his personal data was handed over to strangers, and the message has been sent to anyone watching: cause trouble here, and you’ll pay a price.
Let’s not dress this up. They took a journalist’s phone. A journalist who had just happened to have embarrassed their staff in the national press a few days before. They took my unlock code. They ran down the clock with smirks and shrugs, knowing full well I had a plane to catch. This wasn’t a mistake. This was a message: you embarrassed us, so we’re taking a piece of you. And the worst part? They knew I couldn’t do a damn thing about it unless I fancied missing another flight and spending possibly another 2 day in Delhi Airport, or worse.
So here I am, writing this post on a different phone, still angry, even further out of pocket, and still without that device.
The first time I passed through Delhi airport, nothing changed until the videos went viral. This time? No videos. No viral moment. And so no phone.
I know the game now. I can bitch and complain all I like to them in messages or on my own blog, and it will be as effective as a fart in a hurricane. The only way I’ll ever get that phone back – or its contents – is if this post spreads far enough to embarrass them all over again.
So if you’ve read this far, and you think a journalist probably shouldn’t have his phone stolen by airport security after he criticises them… maybe share this.
Because clearly, being right means nothing, and having rights means even less. If it doesn’t embarrass those in authority, nothing will change.
Which means they will get away with it. Which means they’ll do it again.
PS: If you are flush and can help with covering the costs of that phone, please do so HERE
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