PUNE: Unclaimed walking sticks, golf clubs, baby walkers, jackets, electronic goods and even handbags left behind by passengers at the Pune airport will soon go under the hammer.Officials at the airport will auction these items for three days, starting on September 25. A total of 454 jackets, 6 blazers, 8 leather jackets, many other garments, 27 handbags, 23 small bags, 24 purses, 45 shawls, 20 walking sticks, 4 walkers, 1 golf club, 12 seating mats are up for grabs this time.“The Pune airport hosts more than 14,000 passengers every day. On any given day, as many as 10-15 different kinds of items are left behind by passengers,” said an airport official. “Items that remained unclaimed until March this year are being auctioned off this time,” he added.“Things are mainly left behind during the security check-in process. The security check-in process here is a bit chaotic because of space constraints and the increase in the number of flights and passengers. At times, due to the bunching of flights, passengers are in a great hurry and they forget to pick up all their things. Usually, when they remember, the passengers return to claim their lost goods, but sometimes, no one comes to claim them. Such items are handed over to us by the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) personnel at the airport,” the official said.All articles left behind by passengers are stored as per the norms of the Airports Authority of India (AAI). However, as there is a paucity of storage space at the airport, the goods are periodically auctioned off. The AAI is supposed to keep an unclaimed article found on its premises for a period of three months, though perishable goods are kept only for 48 hours. Unclaimed articles are usually detected by the CISF personnel, or are handed over to them by the cleaning staff or other workers at the airport. The CISF staff deposit such articles with the designated AAI office. If the unclaimed article is a bag or a pouch, then it is opened to ascertain the nature of its contents. The article is then screened to obviate security concerns. After that, it is recorded and stored with the AAI’s lost property office.In March, the CISF had launched an application called “Lost and Found” which now helps passengers directly register their lost items and get the status report immediately from the airports.Explaining the reasons why passengers don’t reclaim their lost properties, aviation expert Dhairyashil Vandekar said, Most items are reclaimed. But at times, passengers cannot recollect where they left behind their things. Sometimes, the item (in terms of value) is not worth the effort to reclaim it. Many passengers do not even try as they are not aware of the efficient system in place for reclaiming lost articles.”

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