Bholanath Pandey, who hijacked flight for Indira Gandhi, passed away, was MLA from Ballia

Senior Congress leader and former Ballia MLA Bholanath Pandey has passed away. His body has been kept at his Lucknow residence for the last rites. According to the information, his last rites will be performed tomorrow morning.

Let us tell you that there is an interesting story related to Bholanath Pandey. Actually, in the year 1978, Indira Gandhi was arrested and kept in Tihar Jail on the charge of an alleged scam. Then, in the name of freeing Indira Gandhi, Bholanath Pandey hijacked an Indian Airlines plane.

Bholanath Pandey was accompanied by his friend Devendra Nath Pandey in this task. Both of them together hijacked Indian Airlines flight IC 410 on 20 December 1978. After this hijack, they demanded Indira Gandhi’s release from jail.

Bholanath Pandey had also demanded that all cases against Sanjay Gandhi be dropped. The flight that was hijacked had 132 people on board. Two former ministers of the Emergency period, AK Sen and Dharam Bir Sinha, were also among the passengers on board the Boeing 737.

The flight from Calcutta to Delhi took off from Lucknow airport at 5.45 pm. The flight was just 15 minutes away from reaching Delhi when there was some commotion in the 15th row. Bholanath Pandey and Devendra Nath Pandey got up from their seats and reached the cockpit. After entering the cockpit, they made the flight captain announce that the flight has been hijacked and they are going to Patna instead of Delhi. After some time, it was said that the flight will go to Varanasi.

After some time, Flight Captain MN Bhattiwala said in an interview that the incident was very strange. First they asked to go to Nepal, then Bangladesh. Actually, they had forgotten the geography they had studied in school. The hijackers then started giving speeches in Hindi and introduced themselves as members of Youth Congress. They also said that they believed in non-violence and would not cause harm. They also raised slogans of Indira Zindabad and Sanjay Zindabad in the flight. Many passengers also clapped at this.

According to media reports, most of the passengers did not take the hijacking seriously. One even laughingly asked to go to Nepal instead of Varanasi. Finally the flight landed in Varanasi and after hours of talks between the then Chief Minister of UP Ram Naresh Yadav and the hijackers, all the passengers were released.

The special thing was that the hijackers used a toy gun for this. Later, Bholanath Pandey said in an interview that it was completely a political protest. Later, he was also given a ticket by the Congress.