New Delhi, Nov 10 (PTI) Airports guarding force CISF will hold a national conference on ensuring better and hassle-free security services to differently-abled air passengers on Thursday, officials said on Wednesday.

The all-India conference will be chaired by CISF director general (DG) M A Ganapathy and representatives from about 150 disability rights NGOs, airports security body Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS), Ministry of Civil Aviation and CISF security chiefs of all 64 airports under its charge will participate in the event, which will have both physical and virtual attendance.

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"The day-long conference aims to further streamline the security protocols that are undertaken in context of differently-abled passengers at airports under our cover.

"The Central Industrial Security Force is committed to make air travel absolutely smooth and happy for such passengers and this conference is aimed to further thrash out issues in this domain," CISF Deputy Inspector General (operations) Anil Pandey told PTI.

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He said the force also plans to replicate the 'swarnim sewa' facility, currently operational for passengers at the Hyderabad airport, at other such civil aviation facilities under its control.

Under the 'swarnim sewa' facility, senior citizens, differently-abled, first-time fliers, pregnant women and other such category of passengers are provided special assistance by CISF personnel during entry and exit at airports.

The current security guidelines for frisking differently-abled passengers, their equipments like wheelchairs, artificial limbs and others were brought in by the BCAS following the 2016 Somalia blast where a wheelchair-bound passenger was suspected to have carried out a blast in the aircraft after he tricked security at the Mogadishu airport.

A senior aviation security officer said while the guidelines issued by the CISF make it clear that passengers with special needs, donning artificial limbs and on wheelchairs need to be frisked with all due respect and courtesy, some stray incidents do take place where passengers allege they were not treated well by the security personnel.

Recently, noted dancer and actor Sudhaa Chandran had issued a video statement, saying she felt "humiliated" when she was asked by a CISF personnel at the Mumbai airport to remove her artificial limb.

The CISF soon after issued an apology to Chandran over social media saying, "as per protocol, prosthetics are to be removed for security checks only under exceptional circumstances".

"We assure Ms.Sudhaa Chandran that all our personnel will be sensitised again on the protocols so that no inconvenience is caused to travelling passengers," the CISF had said.

The conference aims to standardise the process across all airports under the CISF cover in dealing with differently-abled passengers and address their problems appropriately, another officer said.

Presentations will be shown to all the participating stakeholders as to what and how the CISF undertakes security checks of such passengers and their feedback, grievances and suggestions will be noted during the event, he said.

The CISF is designated as the national aviation security force and it has functions under the control of the Union home ministry. It has 64 civil airports of the country under its cover at present.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)