Mithun K

Review of Delhi International Airport Li...

Had a bad travel experience.

Had a bad travel experience.

I was flying to Bangalore via Delhi from an international location.

The international flight landed in Delhi well on time. My baggage was supposed to be checked until Bangalore. When getting off the flight in Delhi, we were asked to pick our checked baggage and then go to customs. We waited at a queue mostly for self reporting related to covid travel. On the way, 2-3 people checked the boarding pass and blindly stamped as Quarantine required . Then we moved to immigration counter which had about 20-25 min wait. After we picked the baggage, we had to wait at the customs line for more than an hour. It was complete chaos and some people were moved out of the line who arrived by Air France/KLM (by some random security person). Rest of them got their bags scanned by customs (the officer didn t seem to care). Next we were asked to standing in another queue (no boards, nothing!)...2-3 people again asked about covid test report..after I told that I had a negative covid result, he asked me to fill a covid quarantine exemption form and go to counter 2. I filled the form (which says asks for exemption from quarantine and also says that I promise to quarantine!). I looked for queue for counter 2. Supposedly, everyone was just standing in one queue. Another person at end of queue again checked the test report and asked to go to counter 1. People were just crowding counter 1 (where there were 3-4 officials). No queue! Someone from counter 1 then signed the form and asked to go to counter 2. Again, no queue on counter 2..again someone signs something and asks to go to counter 3. Since no queue, people are just in a hurry to get their stuff done with no basic courtesy. Someone at counter 3 then stamps the boarding pass with something like exempted from quarantine . I rush towards the domestic transfer since very few time was left. There is another queue for domestic departures! A security guy verifies the passport and ticket and then allows to go to the airline counter. The airline counter had 100s of people in the queue to check their bag. I waited almost 1 hour 20min and finally checked my baggage. Since, I was not given a boarding pass for my domestic flight at the source, the official asks me to do a self checkin at a kiosk and print the boarding pass. After printing the boarding pass, the official then checked my baggage. Finally, I had to go through security which was another long queue (boarding for my domestic flight had already started!) Fortunately, I finished my security check and reached the gate during the final call for departure.

Transferring from international terminal to domestic shouldn t be this complicated. It took about 4 hour 10 min after landing in Delhi to reach the gate for domestic flight! The whole ordeal was because of too many people and mismanaged staff. India and Indians deserve a better travel experience.