Airlines lobby against additional rights to Middle Eastern carriers
NEW DELHI: Indian airlines part of the lobby group Federation of Indian Airlines (FIA) have opposed the grant of additional rights to Middle Eastern airlines in India. “We have learnt from the travel trade in Dubai that Emirates and flydubai plan to operate additional flights to Kerala in the months of August and September 2017, ostensibly to cater to peak season traffic,” FIA wrote to the aviation ministry, in a letter dated July 20 that was reviewed by Mint.
“The UAE (United Arab Emirates) carriers should not be allowed to operate additional flights in excess of their capacity entitlements, as the existing capacity entitlements adequately cater to the traffic demand between lndia and Dubai. Furthermore, the carriers of both sides are already utilising the entitlements fully, deploying in excess of 130,000 seats per week in each direction between lndia and Dubai,” the letter stated.
FIA is led by InterGlobe Aviation Pvt. Ltd-run IndiGo, SpiceJet Ltd, Jet Airways (India) Ltd and GoAir that, between them, control about 75% of the domestic market. The Dubai-based airlines currently have a large number of aircraft lying idle, due to the downturn in the economies of the Middle East and the withdrawal of multiple daily flights between Dubai and Qatar, as a result of which they want to tap India’s peak traffic in AugustSeptember, vitiating the levelplaying field between the airlines of both sides, added the FIA letter.
The local airlines feel revenues and profits earned by them in the peak season as well as sustainability of operations on the Kerala-Dubai sector will be hit by grant of additional rights to the foreign airlines.
“It is our urgent submission to your kind offices that any request from the UAE carriers to operate additional flights to and from Kerala should not be acceded to and the level-playing field be maintained,” said FIA. Responses from Emirates and flydubai were awaited at the time of going to press.
Local airlines have told the aviation ministry separately, according to an airline official who did not want to be named, that bilaterals should only be given on mutually acceptable terms.