Foreign carriers reap benefits of bilateral air pacts

New Delhi: Foreign carriers such as Singapore Airlines, Emirates and Lufthansa have benefited the most from traffic rights assigned to designated carriers as part of India's bilateral air service agreements with various countries. In contrast, the utilisation of available traffic rights on international routes by Indian air carriers has dipped to nearly 24% from over 35% a few years back.
Last year, the falling share of Indian carriers on international routes had forced the Centre to consider reviewing such bilateral agreements. The Centre had, however, decided against such reviews.
Between 2004 and 2009, when the government had pitched for bilateral traffic rights, foreign airlines used half of available seat entitlements. In the year ending March 2009, these carriers together operated 3,20,052 seats per week to and from India, against 1,62,670 seats by Indian carriers.
During the economic downturn which started in 2008, many Indian carriers slashed flights to check losses as traffic plunged. Following this, Indian aviation authorities were reluctant to offer more seats for foreign carriers. Since 2009, the government has negotiated air traffic rights with just two countries: Qatar and Nepal.
“Before negotiations for more seats with foreign countries, the government asked Indian carriers to state their requirements. Based on that, agreements were concluded. If Indian carriers failed to operate those seats, what can the government do? An agreement with a sovereign country cannot be reversed,” said a government official.
20/07/10 Nirbhay Kumar/Financial Express

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Categories: Foreign Jul 2010, Indian Aviation- In General Jul 2010