The Centre will protect its airlines and not allow foreign carriers to take advantage of India’s economic growth and the tourism sector, according to Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju. “I think Indians (domestic airlines) should get advantage in India. How many destinations do the countries with which we have an air service agreement give us? Just look at how many destinations India is offering them,” Mr. Raju said in an interview, weeks before the final civil aviation policy was to be placed before the Union Cabinet.
Open skiesIndia is not yet ready for ‘open skies’ where there are no restrictions on flights or seats or routes from a particular country, Mr. Raju said.
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“Most countries world over work in the interest of their own players and I think, it’s time India should also start working in the interest of their own players,” he said.
Countries sign air service agreements to decide the flights or seats per week that can fly into each other’s country. While India has ‘open skies’ policy for the U.S. and near open skies for the U.K. (restriction on flights to and from Mumbai and Delhi Airports), it has put some restriction on other countries on either the number of seats or airports they can fly to.
The minister’s statement comes on the back of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Qatar visit not yielding renewal of the air service bilateral agreement with the gas-rich Gulf country.
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Mr. Raju said while India offered many destinations, 13 in all, to Qatar, it has only opened up one airport, Doha, for the Indian players.
“India has certain advantages and they (Qatar) want to contribute to their GDP (gross domestic product) with Indian advantage and we would like to contribute to Indian GDP to our advantage,” he said. While Qatar has been pressing for an increase in traffic rights, Indian carriers have not utilised their full quota of seats for Doha.
The civil aviation minister said that Air India needs to “pull up its socks” in a bid to get returns and fulfil its economic objectives.
“It’s a beautiful airline so in that sense you will like it to survive but you can’t commit the taxpayers’ money for eternity. It won’t work that way,” Mr. Raju said.
Equity infusionIt will be for the government of the day to decide whether the national carrier would need equity infusion beyond 2020-21. As part of the restructuring plan, Air India has received government funding of Rs.24,793 crore out of the total Rs.30,000 crore which is supposed to come by 2020-21.
On domestic airlines’ threat to move court if the Civil Aviation Policy doesn’t come out in their favour, the minister said: “In our country, even a murderer is entitled to go to court. You have no control over anybody going to the court.”