Sitarist Anoushka Shankar, daughter of late legendary sitar maestro Ravi Shankar, took to Instagram on Wednesday evening to express her frustration with Air India over the damage caused to her sitar during travel.
The Grammy nominated sitarist shared a video on Instagram, expressing shock and dismay: “This was my first time flying Air India in a long time… after 15 or 17 years, this is the first time anything like this has happened to my instrument.”
The British American musician, known globally for her work across classical and contemporary genres, said she was “devastated” and “truly disturbed” by the condition of her instrument, alleging that the extent of the damage indicated “wilful disregard”.
She revealed that she discovered significant cracks in her sitar following a recent flight.
In her post, Shankar pointed out that she always travels with a hard protective case and paid a handling fee for extra care, yet found her instrument damaged on arrival. “How on earth does damage like this happen without wilful disregard?” she wrote.
She showed the cracks on her sitar in the video, explaining, “First, I was looking at the top of my sitar and I thought it was really out of tune. After I tuned it, I picked it up to play and that’s when I realised…” She questioned the airline in anguish: “How have you done this? I have special cases, you charge a handling fee and yet you've done this?”
The musician noted that despite taking “thousands of flights” with other carriers, she had never experienced such damage to her instrument.
Her post quickly drew support from fans and fellow musicians. Comedian Zakir Khan commented, “This is extremely heartbreaking,” while music composer Vishal Dadlani wrote, “God, that’s heartbreaking! I’m so sorry.”
Musician Anvita Shankar added, “This is unbelievable. How terribly @airindia must’ve handled the sitar for this to happen inside those secure hard cases!!?? I’m so sorry.”
Her revelation has reopened a long standing debate over how airlines handle fragile musical instruments.
Many Indian musicians have previously complained of damage or loss when travelling, especially on flights where instruments must be checked in as cargo rather than carried onboard.
Just last month, Anoushka Shankar received her 11th Grammy nomination in the Best Global Performance category for Daybreak, a collaboration with her cousin Alam Khan and percussionist Sarathy Korwar.