Vistara responds as man slams airline over ‘short flight non-vegetarian’ food policy

A passenger criticised Vistara over the absence of non-vegetarian meal options on a short flight. The passenger, Soumitra, expressed his frustration in a post on X on March 5.

Soumitra’s post detailed an interaction with a stewardess who informed him that non-vegetarian meals were not served due to the short duration of the flight.

“I don’t get the connection between duration and non-veg,” Soumitra said in his post. Criticising the airline’s policy, Soumitra suggested, “Vistara should call themselves a half-service airline!”

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He also humorously questioned if the airline was planning to “fire up” a tandoor for longer flights.

See Soumitra’s post here:

Responding to the situation, Vistara addressed Soumitra’s concerns in a series of posts. In its first post, the airline expressed its concern and desire to investigate the matter further.

In a follow-up response, Vistara explained, “Hi Soumitra, we value your preferences and choices regarding inflight meals. While we are constantly improving our services, please note that the mentioned flight was short with slightly reduced flying time. As a standard procedure, we currently offer vegetarian meals in your booked cabin.”

In another response, the airline elaborated on its service design, emphasising that it aims to ensure all customers are served, and necessary procedures are completed by the crew within the allocated time.

“The services are set, keeping in mind that all customers should be served and necessary procedures to be completed by the crew well within the time. We appreciate your understanding of the same and hope to delight you soon. Thanks, Aishwarya.”

The incident has led to a flurry of reactions from social media users, while several people expressed their thoughts in the comments section of the post.

“Still didn’t answer the question that was asked. What precisely is the correlation between serving customers on time and non-vegetarian food,” a user asked. “The Pune Ahmedabad leg doesn’t serve non-veg food, just because it’s going to or coming from Gujarat,” another user said.

A section of the internet even shared similar experiences, like, “This once happened to me on a Mumbai New Delhi Air India flight. They gave everyone Idli Sambar by default and when I asked for non-veg food, they gave the same reason. Finally, they gave me an omelette sausage meal after they apparently ‘searched’ for it”.

Since being shared online, the post went viral with over 2 lakh views.