Indian man alleges COVID testing at Mumbai airport as "scam"

Mumbai : An Indian-origin man, who came from UK to attend the funeral of his father in law, has alleged that authorities at Mumbai airport are doing a "scam" over COVID testing to mint more money from foreign travellers.

Manoj Ladwa and his wife arrived in Mumbai on December 30 to attend his father-in-law's funeral. He tested positive for Covid at the airport test centre.

He had tested negative before boarding the flight from London. Mr. Manoj demanded a second test to confirm he is positive, but was denied. He was reportedly shifted to a government-run quarantine facility and missed the funeral.

He recorded a video live from the Mumbai airport and narrated the whole incident.

"I have been magically tested positive at Bombay international airport. These four people are from the same flight as us, Virgin. Apparently, Virgin let so many of these people on a flight who are all positive but were negative yesterday," he said.

"I am here trying to get to my father-in-law's funeral. Sharmili, her father died 24 hours ago, we rushed to get to India and these people are screwing this over to try and get more money out of us," Mr Ladwa alleged, adding, "This is just unreal."

In the video, he also claims that he took a lateral flow test in front of the Mumbai authorities and he tested negative in that.

"I want an independent test. They are denying me an independent test," he alleged, adding that they had been stuck for four hours at the airport.

"This is a scam. Apparently Virgin allowed 15 (Covid positive) people onto a flight," he alleged.

"There is nobody responsible here. This is scam. It's a scam. We are being scammed," Mr Ladwa said at the end of the video.