A few days after Air India took pride in the fact that it will be serving ‘stocked food’ from India while returning from foreign cities, a passenger was appalled to find a cockroach in his mid-air meal.

The incident took place on a Mumbai bound flight on Saturday morning when a passenger named Rohit Raj Singh Chauhan found a dead cockroach inside his packed idli-vada lunch. He complained to the crew about the abysmal quality of food but his complaint fell on deaf ears.

With no other option available to him he decided to use the power of social media and posted a photograph of a cockroach lying next to his idli-vada. According to TOI, he later filed a complaint with the authorities at Mumbai airport.

Photo: Twitter/Manoj Khandekar; Cockroach served to the passenger on board Air India flight

He found the insect when the crew had just started distributing food to all the passengers but they decided to out rightly ignore Chauhan’s plea. "Since the crew members were not listening, I returned it to them. I even objected to their serving food to others, but to no avail," he told TOI.

Air India manager Rajendra Malhotra on the other hand rejected these claims by saying that they hadn’t received any complaint in Bhopal.

Last week it was reported that Air India decided to save Rs 49 crore annually by serving food which had been stocked from India while returning from foreign destinations.

The debt ridden airlines served stale food on 11 flights returning from eight foreign cities. "When the aircraft departs from here (India), the food is stocked in chillers to keep it fresh. So, when the aircraft is returning from a foreign city to an Indian city, this food is served to customers," the official said, assuring that it remains "fresh and tasty".

Last year in July, the airline received a lot of flak after bedbugs infested Air India's overseas flights as passengers in business class of Mumbai-bound aircraft from the US this week complained of the crawling insects.