Around 1,000 passenger complaints have been received against Air India during the last three months related to various issues, including refund of fares, overbooking of flights, and staff behaviour, Minister of State for Civil Aviation V K Singh said on Monday. The Tata Group on January 27 took control of Air India after winning the bid for the airline on October 8 last year. "Ministry of Civil Aviation has been receiving grievances related to air transport, including Air India, on the various issues such as refund of fares, flight issues, staff behaviour, baggage issues, overbooking of flights, etc," Singh said in his written reply to a question in Rajya Sabha.
The academy, a joint venture project, would conduct short term courses approved by the Director General of Civil Aviation and Transport Canada to train pilots and ground staff, Hemant H Shah, managing director of Cubex India.
NSG 'Sky Marshals' travel alone or in pairs on-board Indian airlines aircraft like normal passengers but they have a concealed weapon and some specialised gadgets to combat hijackers and rescue passengers in case such an incident takes place.
During this financial year, the country's airports will handle 85 million passengers, likely to grow to 250-300 million in a decade, Zaidi estimates.
'A passenger on our flight AI130, operating London-Mumbai on March 10, was found smoking in the lavatory. Subsequently he behaved in an unruly and aggressive manner, despite repeated warnings,' Air India said.
Indian airlines on Wednesday filled aviation turbine fuel (ATF) into the tanks of their aircraft at Rs 68,000 a kilolitre. Around the same time, ATF sold at $1,037.8 (Rs 41,500) a kilolitre at the Singapore airport -- full 39 per cent below Indian prices.
The airline industry was impacted last year by the global economic slowdown but the growing Indian and Chinese markets are expected to help boost the sector, Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh said.
The policy has been finalised after nearly eight months since the Ministry came out with the revised draft in October 2015.
Latur and Nanded in Marathwada region of Maharashtra would soon be on the aviation map with the launch of flights from this metropolis to these towns, Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel has said.
Issues raised by the industry, like rationalisation of the eight per cent central excise on jet fuel, still remain to be addressed. As a result of the government abolishing five per cent customs duty on aviation turbine fuel from Tuesday, state-run oil firms have cut jet fuel prices by Rs 2,100 per kilo litre, on top of the 17 per cent price reduction announced late last week.
Aviation watchdog DGCA has issued a warning letter to Akasa Air's accountable manager Vinay Dube, who is also its founder and CEO, for regulatory lapses, days after the airline was warned for violating norms related to handling dangerous goods.
Maintaining that the air cargo and some other areas in the Indian aviation sector were very weak, the government on Thursday said it was mulling the opening of these areas to private and foreign investment.
On July 25 and 26, the regulator's team carried out the surveillance of Air India in the areas of internal audit, accident prevention work and availability of required technical manpower.
In a bid to bring down the cost of air operations, Aviation and Petroleum ministries will meet FM to get ATF notified as 'declared good'.
The entire construction of the Navi Mumbai airport project is expected to be completed in five phases.
Though NOC was issued by the Ministry last week, this was the first formal statement by the AirAsia CEO on microblogging site Twitter.
Even in the domestic aviation scene, consolidation talks are on among some private airlines.
With airfares spiralling, members of a Parliamentary panel grilled top officials of the Civil Aviation Ministry and demanded quick action to curb overpricing of air tickets.
An Air India aircraft with 242 passengers on board heading to London crashed in the Meghaninagar area near Ahmedabad airport on Thursday afternoon, the police said.
Prime Minister Narendra D Modi virtually inaugrated the new terminal building of the Veer Savarkar International Airport in Port Blair, the capital city of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands on Tuesday, July 18, 2023.
Aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has sought a report from Air India on reports that an aircraft that was to operate a scheduled flight has been deployed for flying out the Indian cricket team from Barbados, according to officials.
In a move that signifies a major leap for India's aerospace manufacturing capabilities, the collaboration will establish a final assembly line for the Falcon 2000 jets in Nagpur, Maharashtra.
Demand for the Christmas period is expected to rise further in the coming days.
Mumbai airport, which has limited capacity for expansion, is being expanded to handle 40 million passengers annually by 2010.
Limits and high taxes on FDIs have led to lesser investments in the Indian aviation sector.
Airbus will increase sourcing of components from India, which offers plenty of opportunities, according to the aircraft maker's CEO Guillaume Faury. The European major, which has bagged huge aircraft orders from IndiGo and Air India, doubled its sourcing of components and services from India to 1 billion euros during the period from 2019-2023, he said.
The Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal has suspended two employees of the air traffic controller department for "carelessness", according to CAAN spokesperson Jagannath Niroula.
Says banks strong enough to tackle the problem on their own
Meeting on Tuesday to decide on letting foreign airlines buy into domestic ones.
Executives from India's leading airlines are conducting internal meetings to devise alternative routes for their international flights that currently pass through Pakistani airspace.
Civil Aviation minister Praful Patel on Wednesday said the modernisation and restructuring of major airports has started with Delhi and Mumbai airports.
Indian airports have been at a disadvantage because of high taxes, cumbersome visa and foreign exchange norms, losing out to peers in the Gulf.
The prevalent practice is that airlines have to pay between Rs 4,000 and Rs 4,500 per filled seat as departure tax.
The proposal is awaiting final policy sanction from the home ministry.
'Who tried engine relight?' 'If the first officer was the one flying at takeoff, the captain may have taken control immediately post-thrust loss.' 'But the AAIB report doesn't clarify any of this.'
Anil Khimani, the last victim of the horrific June 12 Ahmedabad plane crash identified through DNA tests, has been cremated in Gujarat's Kutch district, bringing closure to the family after two weeks of wait and distress that included submission of samples twice.
Goa's second airport began operations last week and if all goes according to plans, the state will be the base for a new regional airline, Fly91. Promoted by the ex-executive vice-president of now grounded Kingfisher Airlines, Manoj Chacko, and Fairfax India's former head, Harsha Raghavan, the airline will offer no-frills buy on board product and serve unconnected routes with two ATR 72 aircraft. An application for the initial no-objection clearance was filed with the civil aviation ministry last week.
We've witnessed the first phase of the mess in the country's public sector-driven aviation sector. In the absence of properly-thought-out rules, the next, a privately-driven one, awaits us.
