NEW DELHI: IndiGo today defended the action of the groundstaff involved in the manhandling of a passenger last month, saying its staff was “only trying to prevent a serious potential mishap”.In a letter written to the civil aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju on Wednesday, IndiGo president Aditya Ghosh also said he personally called the manhandled passenger, Rajeev Katyal to apologise.Ghosh’s letter came following summon by the civil aviation minister to all the parties involved in the manhandling incident of October 15."The reality is that my colleagues were only trying to act in the best interest of the safety of Mr. Katyal and trying to prevent a potential serious mishap," said Ghosh.The IndiGo president acknowledged that there is a need to improve communication with the customers, Ghosh added."Employees were immediately suspended and we conducted detailed investigation. Incident should have been avoided by improving our communication with customer," said Ghosh."I personally called & apologised to Mr Katyal (customer) 3 weeks ago. I remember telling him that I had seen video and assured him that we will investigate this matter thoroughly."The manhandling incident, which occurred on October 15, came to light after a video was released yesterday of the tussle, filmed by an employee of IndiGo.After alighting from the Airbus A-320 on a Delhi-Chennai Indigo flight, a passenger Rajiv Katyal got into an argument with some ground staff and allegedly abused them. What sparked this argument has not been ascertained yet. Two or three IndiGo ground staffers then stopped Katyal from boarding the bus which was taking passengers to the terminal. They then manhandled him and dragged him on the tarmac for over a minute.Earlier on Wednesday, BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain said “arrogant behaviour has become a norm for IndiGo”. He was referring to an incident involving badminton star PV Sindhu.On November 4, Sindhu took to social media to allege that one of the Indigo’s staff had misbehaved with her.