An aircraft carrying 170 passengers including West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee was forced to seek emergency landing when it ran short on fuel after being made to hover in the night sky for about 40 minutes on Wednesday due to a technical issue.
The Trinamool Congress smelt in the incident a conspiracy to "kill" Banerjee for protesting strongly against the Central government's demonetisation initiative.
The plane operated by a private airline took off from Patna an hour late at 7.35 p.m.
Due to technical reasons, before landing at the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport here, it hovered over the Kolkata sky and then finally landed around 9 p.m.
Airport officials said such developments were normal and an every day affair in aviation.
But State Urban Development Minister Firhad Hakim alleged that the Air Traffic Control delayed in giving the green signal to the plane to land despite the "pilot pointing out that it was running out of fuel".
“Subsequently, the airplane made a normal landing at Kolkata airport at 8 40 PM (delayed by an hour due to congestion). The fuel on arrival was more than the minimum diversion fuel. There has been no violation or breech of any regulatory requirement in the above mentioned scenario,” the statement added.