Flyer groups to discuss fare hikes with airline CEOs

Mumbai: For the first time ever, airline CEOs and consumer rights' groups will come face to face on a common platform to discuss airfare hike on Monday. Till now, all the meetings held to discuss the ever-increasing air tariff only involved the government and the airline industry representatives.
The first meeting of the ministry of civil aviation's newly-formed Economic Advisory Council (EAC), to be held in Delhi on Monday, will bring together parties on both sides of the fare hike equation. The EAC's members include CEOs of all scheduled airlines and representatives of consumer forums.
Sudhakara Reddy, president of Air Passengers' Association of India (APAI) and member of EAC, is expected to take up the issue of fare hike with the airline industry bigwigs.
Since EAC is only an advisory body, it is scheduled to meet once in a quarter. So the day-to-day job of monitoring airfares and taking up relevant issues with airline representatives would continue to be done by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation's (DGCA) Tariff Analysis Unit, which was set up recently in response to fare hikes. The unit will continue to bring to the notice of the DGCA any abrupt increase in airfares so that timely directive is issued to the concerned airline.
12/12/10 Manju V/Times of India

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Categories: Indian Aviation- In General Dec 2010