The Air Passengers Association of India (APAI) wants the Regional Connectivity Scheme (RCS) – Ude Desh Ka Aam Nagrik (UDAN) — to be fine-tuned and recalibrated with details of money spent by the government in airline subsidies, the number of routes suspended. The air passengers’ body said the details must be made public for the sake of transparency.
In his outlook for 2020, APAI president D. Sudhakara Reddy said there was a growing cacophony of claims by airlines about poor bottomlines and other difficulties being faced by them, which are unsubstantiated.
“The irony is that while this high-decibel lobbying is going on, elsewhere in the world, particularly in the U.S. and Europe, most of the airlines are showing profits consecutively for the past 10 years or so. APAI is reiterating its stand that a forensic audit should be carried out by the relevant government agencies on airlines’ balance sheets to know what exactly is happening,” he said.
Mr. Reddy said the government was about to announce the auction for the fourth edition of UDAN to give a push to the scheme while making efforts to privatise six airports to create the desired aviation infrastructure in the country.
“Our considered view is that the achievement of flying 35 lakh passengers under the scheme since its inception augurs well. Yet, to have the desired level of excellence, the scheme will have to be fine-tuned and recalibrated. APAI has been expressing concern that the scheme in the present form is opaque and there is a nagging doubt that airlines are taking advantage of the loopholes, deciding arbitrarily how many seats have to be allocated under the scheme,” he said.
The APAI president said passengers have the right to know how much money has been spent by the government on subsidy to the airlines, how many routes have been suspended by the airlines after launching them, the reasons for this and so on. “Needless to say, such an exercise will make the scheme more transparent and enable objective assessment of the efficacy of UDAN,” he said.
Mr. Reddy said the Airports Authority of India (AAI) has spent over ₹1,100 crore for revamping airports, but still the facilities and operations at these airports remained woefully inadequate. “While the rhetoric is high, traffic levels are low. Viability of the airports has to be established on a sound footing. Airlines are reluctant to include these airports in their network,” Mr. Reddy said.
There are 449 airports in the country including helipads. A majority of the unserved and underserved airports are in this category, the APAI president said. Those with scheduled services, sometimes, see footfalls as few as 7,000, he said.
“There are indications that 75% of the airports owned by it are registering losses, most being regional airports. With the profitable airports being privatised, AAI will soon have a stable revenue stream, which should be deployed towards developing regional airports. Airports development should, therefore, take place concurrently with UDAN to have the desired effect. Indeed, these are some of the challenges that the aviation sector will face in 2020 and beyond,” Mr. Reddy said.
