Private airlines continue to present a united front in opposing the new ground handling policy, which is scheduled to become operational from the July 1.
Private airlines continue to present a united front in opposing the new ground handling policy, which is scheduled to become operational from the July 1.
The policy seeks to eliminate all but three parties from ground handling: Airport operator or a joint venture; subsidiaries of Air India or its JVs; and service providers selected through competitive bidding. It covers the metro airports of Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Bangalore and Hyderabad.
In a meeting with civil aviation secretary M Madhavan Nambiar on Monday, representatives of Jet Airways, Kingfisher Airlines, SpiceJet and Indigo as well as Federation of Indian Aviation pointed out several discrepancies in the policy.
Jet’s Naresh Goyal said eliminating private airlines from ground handling would mean a large number of layoffs and substantial losses. Citing the example of London’s Heathrow Airport, the world’s busiest, Goyal said 10-11 different ground handling agencies are functioning there. Rahul Bhatia of Indigo called the ground handling charges by the new designated operators as “daylight robbery”.
The implementation of this policy has already been deferred by six months and the civil aviation ministry had earlier moved a Cabinet note seeking some modifications. Senior ministry officials indicated on Monday that private airlines’ problems were being considered and a solution would have to be found.
Private airlines want to partly retain ground handling facilities even after the new policy comes into effect to avoid revenue loss. Ground handling work has two basic parts — passenger handling at the landside and ramp handling that includes loading and unloading of aircraft and aircraft handling. The airlines wanted to retain ground handling activities at least till the customer checks in.
Under the policy, functions such as loading, unloading and delivery of baggage from the aircraft; cabin cleaning; delivery of passengers from terminal to tarmac and vice-versa — all of these would go out of the private airlines’ purview.
Also, private airlines are unhappy that some of these services would land with the Air India staff.
The new proposals would also deprive private carriers of all consumer interface before passengers board their flights.
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