The future of airport baggage management will dawn in India soon. The trigger could be Renuka Chowdary incident last week at Delhi airport.

The civil aviation ministry is contemplating a RFID baggage system so that in situation like this, any checked-in baggage can be identified electronically and removed at once.

Renuka, a former minister and member of parliament (Rajya Sabha), delayed an Air India flight from Delhi to Hyderabad after checking in, because she reported late for boarding. She had checked in three pieces of baggage which had been loaded on the aircraft. When she reported late, the airline decided to allow her to board since identifying and removing the baggage would have delayed the flight further.  As a security procedure, the airlines do not fly unaccompanied baggage.

Flight AI-126 had arrived from Chicago and was to depart for the final leg of its journey to Hyderabad. As many as 276 passengers boarded the flight at Delhi.

Renuka Chowdary was apparently strolling through the shopping section at the Delhi airport and reported at 7.04 pm for the flight which was supposed to leave at 7 pm. However, she said she was having knee problem but had not been provided with a buggy.

What is RFID system?
The RFID tagging system uses small radio frequency identification devices for identification and tracking. An RFID tagging system includes the tag itself, a read/write device, and a host system application for data collection, processing, and transmission. An RFID tag (sometimes called an RFID transponder ) consists of a chip , onboard memory and an antenna .

How baggage is tracked?
RFID identified user baggage when tagged can be easily linked to the user at all times and tracked. Images of the baggage can be linked to the user profile recorded, again helping in the purpose of security management.