Carriers risk overseas flights over idle rights

Airlines will have to return unused bilateral traffic rights.

The Civil Aviation Ministry has revised the norms for grant of an international permit for domestic airlines. While domestic airlines will need to have at least 20 aircraft to secure international flying rights, the ones that do not utilise the allocated bilateral air traffic rights will have to return it to the Centre for fresh allocation to other airlines, according to the new rules.

Earlier, airlines with five years of domestic flying experience and 20 aircraft in its fleet were eligible for securing international flying rights.

Overseas routes

The new rules state that traffic rights to fly on overseas routes for a particular schedule (summer or winter) will have to be utilised during the same schedule. “Failure to do so shall result in the unutilised rights reverting back to Ministry of Civil Aviation for fresh allocation to other airlines,” according to the circular. The defaulter airline will be ineligible to apply for such rights for the next two schedule periods.

“It is good to note that the Civil Aviation Ministry is discouraging quota squatting,” said Amber Dubey, partner and India head of aerospace and defence at global consultancy KPMG. “Unused quota should be reallocated to interested parties. This helps avoid an artificial shortage of seats and abnormally high fares during peak tourist season.”

Indian carriers have shown poor performance in utilising of air traffic rights compared to their foreign peers.

The domestic carriers were utilising 2.63 lakh seats per week while foreign airlines were utilising 4.65 lakh seats per week to and from India this year, Minister of State Jayant Sinha said in a written reply to Rajya Sabha in August.

Better utilisation

Mr. Dubey, however, said the move to take back the unutilised air traffic rights will lead to better utilisation of the Indian share of bilateral quotas as new Indian carriers such as AirAsia and Vistara are likely to meet the 20 aircraft requirement in the next 12-24 months.

AirAsia will soon induct its seventh aircraft and Vistara’s aircraft fleet will grow to thirteen by the end of this calendar year. At present, IndiGo, Jet Airways, SpiceJet and Air India are permitted to fly to foreign airports from India.