The office of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), the body that regulates aviation in India, is housed in a bunch of stark old drab structures opposite the Safdarjung Airport in New Delhi. Even by the unfathomable methods of government offices in India, this particular office stands out as an absolute riddle. Inside, files vanish. Some reappear in dustbins. Documents immune to these calamities move from one desk to another at a pace that is an affront to the industry it oversees. But then the DGCA has always worked in mysterious ways. "It takes 20 days for some applications to reach the desk of an official, who can give an approval in two minutes," says Jayant Nadkarni, president of Business Aircraft Operators Association (BAOA), the umbrella body of private jet owners in India. Approvals are of course not given in two minutes. The aviation policy draft the government released last Friday, two days after India hopped to 130 in a World Bank's Ease of Doing Business ranking of 189 countries, completely ignores the rotten ways of the DGCA.
Two days before the policy was unveiled, the DGCA served yet another reminder of why it desperately needs an overhaul. With just a day's notice, it banned business jet operators and air charter companies from flying during the fourday India-Africa Forum Summit that began on October 26. Reason: security — a group of state heads was visiting. The ban did not cover scheduled airlines though.
05/11/15 Binoy Prabhakar/Economic Times
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Two days before the policy was unveiled, the DGCA served yet another reminder of why it desperately needs an overhaul. With just a day's notice, it banned business jet operators and air charter companies from flying during the fourday India-Africa Forum Summit that began on October 26. Reason: security — a group of state heads was visiting. The ban did not cover scheduled airlines though.
05/11/15 Binoy Prabhakar/Economic Times
