# Varanasi airport accidental firing: Two injured, passenger held 2026-08-16T13:03:39+00:00 | Governance | Indian Opinion Desk Corroboration: 2 independent outlets (3 source reports) Varanasi airport witnessed chaos on Sunday morning when a licensed pistol accidentally discharged during a security check, injuring two employees. The passenger, Kamlesh Kedar Nath Rai, was travelling to Mumbai with his wife on Air India Express flight IX-1810. The bullet first hit the floor before striking two AAICLAS screeners, including a woman who was shot in the thigh. Aaj Tak reports that Rai, originally from Azamgarh district, is a former BMC corporator from the Congress party and later joined the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena. He was detained and is being questioned. Business Today confirms that airport director Puneet Gupta said both injured staff are stable and undergoing treatment at New Laxmi Trauma Centre. Police are investigating how the weapon discharged despite Rai having declared the pistol and magazine beforehand. Authorities are checking whether standard security procedures were followed during the inspection. ## Coverage - aajtak.in - aajtak.in (2) - bazaar.businesstoday.in This story was synthesised by AI from the 3 sources linked above. Tags: BMC, Kamlesh Rai, Lal Bahadur Shastri International Airport, Shiv Sena, Varanasi Canonical: https://indianopinion.org/varanasi-airport-accidental-firing-two-injured-passenger-held/ License: Summary and commentary (c) Indian Opinion, reusable with attribution. Facts belong to the linked sources. Cite: https://indianopinion.org/varanasi-airport-accidental-firing-two-injured-passenger-held/#story-in-brief How this brief was made: an AI model read the reports linked above and wrote this summary and analysis, which were published automatically. Published briefs are sampled every hour by an automated quality check; the editor verifies its findings and approves corrections, and corrected briefs carry a dated correction line. Stance labels are editorial classifications of how each outlet framed this story, assigned by the same model, not ratings of the outlets. We do no original reporting. Methodology: https://indianopinion.org/ai-use-policy/