Standard Post with Image

Rs 12 Per Ticket Is Cost of An Independent Airline Regulator

  • The civil aviation industry is about to get a new super-cop. And the cop will nick all passengers for Rs 12 for every airplane ride so that his independence as a regulator and enforcer is not compromised.To be called the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), the proposed civil aviation regulator will have twice the budget of the current Director-General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) which has to depend on the government for funds.

  • The CCA will be financially independent and will charge Rs 12 per departing passenger to generate funds. Also, 1 percent of air navigation service (ANS) charges will also go into the CCA’s kitty, whose annual budget will be double that of the present DGCA at about Rs 160 crore.Of course, the CCA is many ways the new avatar of the DGCA. AFPOf course, the CCA is many ways the new avatar of the DGCA as most of its staff will get transferred to the new regulator. The transformation of the DGCA into a more powerful CCA is expected to take place this year itself and the proposal will go to the Union Cabinet for approval by the month-end. Thereafter, a CAA bill is expected to be tabled in parliament later this year.

  • To prevent the new body from functioning as a mere paper tiger, the civil aviation ministry has recommended the appointment of regional ombudsmen, and granting the authority powers for airfare regulation and appellate authority status.“The formation of the CAA is a part of the Prime Minister’s priority thrust area and, hopefully, the Bill will be able to make it to parliament this year itself,” a senior official from the civil aviation ministry said.But will all the new powers of the CCA allow it to actually take action against erring airlines, which have been found flouting safety norms and operating guidelines? Most airlines were reported to have taken liberties with safety, and Jet even allowed a trainee pilot to land an aircraft.

  • Despite unscheduled flight cancellations on a large scale recently by Kingfisher Airlines, the DGCA has not been allowed to suspend the licence of the airline even temporarily under severe political pressure. In the past it has taken such steps, but only against smaller airlines like MDLR and Paramount.The ministry official quoted above, however, defended the DGCA and pointed out that Kingfisher was a large airline, accounting for almost 15 percent of the market. It would have been quite difficult to suspend its licence since “this could have led to severe consequences for the flying public and for airline employees and other stakeholders”.Like the big banks after Lehman, Kingfisher is obviously too big to fail or fault.

  • However, the CAA could be on a stronger wicket compared to the DGCA, which is almost an arm of the ministry. Apart from punitive powers, the CAA will have the power to recruit its own employees, unlike the DGCA which has to make recruitments through the department of personnel and training (DoPT) and the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). The DGCA has numerous posts vacant all the time.

  • Severe understaffing is one of the reasons for the ‘fake’ pilot scam going undetected for long. The DGCA has just 130 employees all over the country and there simply aren’t enough people to do the policing in an aviation industry flying 15 million passengers – or 500,000 a day.The DGCA requires 500 more employees to be able to function properly and though some positions have been sanctioned, they are being filled up very slowly.

  • The CAA, it is proposed, will ensure that airlines adhere to international standards of setting airfares to ensure transparency, and not catch consumers unawares. The DGCA also doesn’t have any mechanism to prevent cartelisation, which the CAA is empowered to prevent.The proposed regional ombudsman typically resolves issues between stakeholders, namely airlines, airport operators, passengers and various other government/non-government agencies like the Air Traffic Control Board.

  • The CAA blueprint has been prepared after studying regulation models in several countries, including those in the UK, the US, China, Germany and France, ministry officials said. Aviation regulatory bodies on the lines of the CAA exist in several countries, including the UK and Singapore.The process to give more powers to the DGCA was expedited after the Mangalore plane crash of 2010, which killed 158 people. In October 2009, the International Civil Aviation Organisation was appointed to carry out a feasibility study for the CAA.The draft bill has also recommended the setting up of a separate body to look into air crashes so that the investigative and regulatory functions of CAA do not conflict with each other. At present, the DGCA does safety audits, grants licenses and also investigates air crashes and near-mishaps.

Source