'Don't impose user fees on air travellers'

NEW DELHI: A parliamentary panel on Thursday recommended immediate withdrawal of user development fees being charged by Hyderabad and Bangalore airports, saying the private operators had invested only Rs 330 crore and Rs 240 crore respectively to develop them.
    
Observing that the government's policy was to make air travel more affordable, the Parliamentary Standing Committee said the UDF imposed on passengers "may be withdrawn immediately and no more UDF may be imposed on passengers in any of the airports."
    
The Committee, headed by CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury, also said any future greenfield or brownfield airports should be developed with the Airports Authority of India (AAI) having a majority stake in a joint venture.
    
It said that while the equity contribution of the private consortia which developed Bangalore airport was only Rs 240 crore, the same for Hyderabad was Rs 330 crore.
    
The rest of the financing came from state support, Airports Authority of India, the state governments and through debt from financial institutions, it said in its report on the functioning of private airports, tabled in Parliament on Thursday.
    
With this pattern of financing, these airports could have been developed and operated by the AAI, with all its expertise, Yechury told reporters here.
    
Asserting that AAI with its resources and expertise should have a "better say in the modernisation of airports" in the country, he said the Committee has recommended that any future greenfield or brownfield airport project "must be done under the management of AAI."
    
"The Committee recommends that any future greenfield airports or brownfield airports project must be done under the management of AAI," the report said.
    
"Joint venture companies can be formulated but the AAI must have a majority holding in the company and management control must rest with it," it said.
    
Regarding the panel's earlier recommendation that the old airports at Hyderabad and Bangalore be reopened, Yechury said the Committee found that closure of the old Bangalore airport was not part of the concession agreement, initially prepared
and approved by the Cabinet.
    
"However, allegedly, the clause related to HAL airport closure was brought at a later stage into the concessional agreement," the report said, pointing out that there were "irregularities" in the agreement and closure was not legally permissible.
    
This also violated the prevalent norm that a new airport cannot be built within a 150 km radius of an existing one, it said.
    
Yechury said both the old airports at Hyderabad and Bangalore had undergone infrastructure development in the recent past with the AAI spending Rs 610 crore in 2007-08.
    
The Committee noted that "hundreds of crores of rupees spent" to develop infrastructure at these airports remained unutilised due to closure of commercial operations and sought relaunch of short-haul flights from the existing airports.
    
On the employees front, the Committee asked the government to review all provisions of the agreements with the private parties to accommodate all AAI employees at their respective workplaces. In this context, it referred to the employees of Delhi Vidyut Board being retained in BSES, Delhi.