Mumbai: You will soon have to pay more every time you fly as the government wants to fund non lucrative regional routes. The civil aviation ministry has proposed a 1per cent cess on airfares and hopes to generate at least Rs 240 crore per year to encourage regional connectivity.
"The focus is to improve regional connectivity in the country and a collection from the cess on tickets will be used in funding the losses of operators on loss-making smaller routes," civil aviation secretary R N Choubey said.
Senior officials said the proposal of the cess on fares (excluding taxes) will form part of the new Draft Civil Aviation Policy that will be unveiled this month. Back-of-the-envelope calculations by the ministry of civil aviation show that 60 million domestic passengers pay an estimated average fare of Rs 4,000 per ticket and a one per cent cess would generate about Rs 240 crore for the govern ment.
21/07/15 Aditya Anand/Mumbai Mirror
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"The focus is to improve regional connectivity in the country and a collection from the cess on tickets will be used in funding the losses of operators on loss-making smaller routes," civil aviation secretary R N Choubey said.
Senior officials said the proposal of the cess on fares (excluding taxes) will form part of the new Draft Civil Aviation Policy that will be unveiled this month. Back-of-the-envelope calculations by the ministry of civil aviation show that 60 million domestic passengers pay an estimated average fare of Rs 4,000 per ticket and a one per cent cess would generate about Rs 240 crore for the govern ment.
21/07/15 Aditya Anand/Mumbai Mirror
