New airlines' overseas flights in a fresh storm

New Delhi: The civil aviation ministry’s plan to allow new airlines to operate international services has run into rough weather, with the defence, home and the external affairs ministries resisting the move.
The railway and law ministers are already opposing scrapping the proposal. The empowered group of ministers (eGOM) — headed by external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee — looking into the matter was to meet on September 20, but the meeting has been postponed. No new date has been fixed for the eGOM meeting, said a government source.
With so many ministries ranged against the proposal to scrap the mandatory five-year domestic service criteria for airlines, the issue has now become politically controversial. It is understood that the home, external affairs and defence ministries have raised several concerns including those related to security, infrastructure constraints and poaching of air force pilots.
While the eGOM has met only once, most of the issues are being discussed by the concerned ministers during informal discussions.
17/09/07 Nirbhay Kumar & G Ganapathy Subramaniam/Economic Times

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