It's Jet vs rest in battle for skies

New Delhi: India’s aviation sector is locked in an intense battle for the skies. The dogfight, this time around, is over flying international.
Sources tell CNN-IBN that domestic airlines, lobbying hard to be allowed to fly out of India, have come together to fight efforts by Jet Airways chief Naresh Goyal to stop newer entrants from operating on international sectors.
The Group of Ministers, which meets on Tuesday, is expected to discuss lowering norms for airlines that want to go international.
Currently, the new entrants need to have a five-year flying record and 20 aircraft. The only two private airlines that meet these norms are Jet Airways and Jetlite, both owned by Naresh Goyal.
Sources tell CNN-IBN that Goyal is lobbying to introduce a profitability criterion, which will effectively keep out the newer airlines out of picture.
But analysts say that shouldn't be the case.
The five-year flying norm was introduced by the Government citing security fears. But domestic carriers argue that airlines like Etihad and al-Jazeera, which are less than two years old, are allowed to fly into India and that the same norms should be applied to outbound flights.
13/08/07 Karma Paljor/CNN-IBN

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Categories: Foreign Aug 2007, General Aviation Aug 2007, Jet Airways Aug 2007