Foreign flights: Kingfisher-Deccan pressurises govt

New Delhi: The fight over flying overseas has entered its final phase. In the latest development, the Kingfisher-Air Deccan combine has stepped up the pressure on government to get rights for foreign flights.
Deccan MD Captain Gopinath wrote a letter to Pranab Mukherjee, who heads a group of ministers (GoM), asking for removal of restriction on operating international flights. The GoM is looking at the issue of relaxing norms for overseas flying, in the process of framing the new Civil Aviation Policy. At present, Jet Airways and its recent acquisition Air Sahara (now JetLite) are the only private carrier that fly abroad. Calling the existing rules discriminatory and favouring only some players, Gopinath wrote that many foreign airlines ‘‘though being one or two years old'' and a small fleet of three to four planes are permitted to operate to many Indian cities.
The GoM met on Tuesday and discussed the new civil aviation policy. At present, the five-year and 20-aircraft rule make Jet and JetLite the only private carrier allowed to fly to foreign shores like UK, US, Europe, Southeast Asia and Canada will be added to the list next month. Under the proposed changes, aviation minister has been talking of a case by case clearance to airlines in which their track record will decide whether they can fly abroad or not.
15/08/07 Saurabh Sinha/Times of India

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Categories: Air Deccan Aug 2007, Foreign Aug 2007, Kingfisher Aug 2007