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The Minister for Civil Aviation, Shri Praful Patel today made a statement in the Lok Sabha regarding the status of implementation of recommendations contained in 78th and 88th Report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Transport Tourism & Culture. In its report dated 2nd March, 2005, the Standing Committee had made 14 recommendations based on its meeting held on 9th August, 2004.
Regarding the observations made by the Standing Committee with regard to opening of international skies to a particular airline and granting it passage rights to some international routes, helping that particular airlines’ IPO prospects, the Minister assured the House that there was absolutely no link whatsoever between Government’s decision of allowing Indian Scheduled Carriers to operate on international routes and the IPO issue of any airline. He clarified that it was not the function of the Government to keep track of IPO issues of private enterprises and, Government decisions are not guided by dates of issues of IPO’s of private companies. The decisions to allow private Airlines to operate an international routes was consciously taken after due consideration. The Ministry of Civil Aviation had been receiving such requests from private airlines to operate on international routes for the past several years. Keeping in view the advantages of the country, Industry Associations and Trade Bodies as well as Ministries like Tourism had been requesting the Government to allow more Indian carriers to operate on international routes, in addition to Air India. It was emphasized that this would help in better utilization of our bilateral rights, improve connectivity and create business opportunities within the country, which in turn would help in economy as a whole.
The Naresh Chandra Committee constituted to prepare a road map for the Civil Aviation Sector also recommended that the private airlines be allowed to operate on international routes in view of the under capacity in the international segment, particularly during peak season and in view of the fact that India is using only 40% by this bilateral rights.
The Minister also emphasized, particularly in the context of the observations of the Standing Committee, that the proposal to allow private airlines to operate on international routes had been under consideration of successive Government for a long time was not a hasty or sudden decision by the present Government.
In respect of the observations of the Standing Committee that there was an element of arbitrariness in imposing restriction on airlines in terms of experience etc. on not allowing all domestic scheduled airlines to fly on international routes, the Minister clarified that the minimum requirement prescribed for airlines to qualify for operation on international routes is entirely based on the consideration that only airlines with proven track records in the domestic sector should be allowed to operate internationally. This was particularly important, as the Government does not want airlines to withdraw operations from domestic routes once they start international operations. This was why a minimum fleet strength of 20 aircraft has been prescribed. This would ensure greater domestic connectivity while enabling the airlines to gain greater experience for operations on international routes at a later stage. The experience clause of 5 years operation was also a carefully thought-out decision based on advice of the safety regulator i.e. the Director General of Civil Aviation
The Standing Committee had observed that the basic objective of the Government behind allowing the private airlines to fly international destinations was to provide connectivity to new international destinations and that this purpose was defeated as the eligible airlines had applied for the same routes as were being operated by the national carriers. The Minister clarified that while it was the intention of the Minister to encourage the operation of eligible airlines to fly to newer destinations, the primary objective was optimum utilization of the bilateral traffic rights.
The Government also feels that there should be increased direct connectivity between point-to-point destinations. If the traffic size between UK and India is significant, the commercial opportunities out of this should ideally be utilized either by Indian carriers or carriers of UK. The Government had approached the issue of liberalization of international services with these objectives in mind. It was emphasized that this was only the beginning. As the process evolved, Government would keep on taking stock of the situation and was confident that newer destinations would certainly get added.
MC:kd/stan.Committee12.5
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