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Members of Parliament cutting across party lines today expressed their appreciation of the performance of the Ministry Civil Aviation Sector especially the handling of the crisis in Mumbai Airport during the Mumbai floods by the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Airport Authority of India. The services of the pilots who had to land and take off in Mumbai Airport under difficult conditions during that time were also appreciated.
Various issues were taken up in today’s meeting. A number of Members expressed concern over the ‘neglect’ of the public carriers viz. Indian Airlines and Air India. To this, the Minister for Civil Aviation, Shri Praful Patel admitted that it was true that not enough cooperation and support had been given to the Indian public carriers over the years. He said that rising beyond political concerns it was now necessary to take remedial action at the earliest with transparency but with promptness. He added that the lack of connectivity that had been highlighted by the Members in course of the meeting would also be solved by this. Interconnectivity between states and international connectivity to different corners of the country would see a vast improvement if the public carriers were strengthened. The Minister added that though private carriers are required to adhere to the Route Dispersal Guidelines it is only the public carrier on whom the Government could rely on for integrating the country.
The Minister also responded to the concern expressed by the Members on ATC delays. He admitted that there were major delays during landing especially over Mumbai and Delhi Airports, triggering of delays over other Airports too. To find a solution to this problem the Ministry had appointed a Committee headed by Shri K. Roy Paul, former Secretary, Ministry of Civil Aviation. The Committee has submitted a report which was under the consideration of Ministry of Civil Aviation. The Ministry has also appointed a Consultant from Australia – a country with similar problems. The Minister said that the procedures would be revised and the current frequency of 20-25 of flight movements per hour would be increased to 50 or more flight movements per hour in a phased manner.
Commenting on the concern expressed by Members on different aspects of aviation security, the Minister said that safety in aviation had to be 100% and there could be no compromise. Safety has to be looked into holistically and very seriously. The DGCA constantly monitored the different aspects of security. The Ministry was looking into ways of strengthening the DGCA with the immense expansion of the Civil Aviation sector.
In reply to queries raised about Mumbai and Delhi Airports, the Minister said that the process of modernization and restructuring of Mumbai and Delhi Airport was underway. The present Government is giving very high priority to all infrastructure sectors including airports. The Committee on Infrastructure, headed by the Prime Minister recently reviewed the process. The Transaction Document for Mumbai and Delhi Airports, the Minister said, would be out next week and the bids for these two airports would be received by mid-September 2005. He regretted the delay but stated that the objective was to build world-class airports in the league of Kualalampur and Dubai Airports. He expressed concern that Singapore in the East and Dubai in the West have become hubs for India only because of their better infrastructure and India’s lack of it.
The Minister stated that the next meeting of the Parliamentary Consultative Committee on Civil Aviation, which would be an inter session meeting, would be on Airports Authority of India.
Members who attended the meeting were S/Shri Tusharbhai A. Choudhay, Madhu Goud Yashki, Sachin Pilot, Santosh Gangwar, Tapir Gao, Ratilal K. Verma, Ramswaroop Koli, Tarit Baran Topdar, Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa, Anandrao Vithoba Adsul, Smt. Sumitra Mahajan, Dr.(Prof.) Prasanna Kumar Patasani, Santosh Bagrodia, , Dr. M.S.Gill, Janardan Dwivedi, Tarlochan Singh, Dinesh Trivedi, N.Jothi, Abdul Wahab Peevee, Sanjay Raut, Dr. Vijay Mallya and Rajeev Shukla.
MC/GK
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