A WORD FROM EDITOR
OVER THE LAST SEVEN
months, the airline industry, the travelling public and the hapless employees have been watching with deep anxiety and some distress what appears to be a slow and painful demise of Kingfisher Airlines, the most glamorous and high-profile airline in the private sector in India that made a valiant attempt to set pioneering standards in the industry. The airline is seemingly afflicted with some mysterious terminal illness that even the well-informed and astute industry analysts are unable to accurately diagnose or explain convincingly. The most commonly offered explanation “mismanagement” is much too simplistic to be plausible. The episode would undoubtedly be earth shattering for the Indian airline industry and the trauma can only be compared with that experienced by the shipping industry on account of the sinking of the Titanic a hundred years ago.
The stakeholders of the civil aviation industry gathered in Delhi on September 21 for an International Conference on Civil Aviation organised by ASSOCHAM during which the problems impinging on the growth and well-being of the industry were discussed threadbare and catalogued. A report on the conference has been included as a part of this issue. Ironically, with the exception of the Minister of Civil Aviation Ajit Singh, who was the chief guest at the conference, representatives of the government i.e. the bureaucracy from the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation and the Airports Authority of India who are responsible for providing the solutions, were conspicuous by their absence. Even the airlines were inadequately represented. Approval by the government of the proposal for foreign direct investment by airlines abroad into Indian carriers did serve to raise the spirits of the industry as if it was a dream come true; but it will take some time for the real impact to be visible. Besides, there are some imponderables that could come in the way.
There are a number of issues of interest analysed in this edition. A.K. Sachdev has focused on how despite the overall growth in the aviation industry in India, regional aviation continues to lag behind and its potential remains largely unexploited. Globally Embraer is making waves with their regional jets, the Embraer 170/190 family that appears to be becoming the first choice for regional carriers. P.P. Rajkumar, an experienced helicopter pilot of the Indian Air Force, describes the pathetic state of aviation infrastructure in the North-east region based on his study of the area during an investigation conducted by him into a major accident at Tawang involving a civil helicopter. Writing from Bangalore, Vasuki Prasad examines the distortion in the aviation industry in respect of employment prospects for pilots that has arisen due to supply forging way ahead of demand caused essentially by a misperception of the sustainability of the boom in civil aviation that began eight years ago.
Writing from Goa, Joseph Noronha explains how the global positioning system and other space-based technologies have brought about a qualitative change in the navigation and air traffic management in civil aviation and B.S. Pawar looks at the potential of the rotary wing platforms for use by law enforcement agencies. All these apart from the regular features. Welcome aboard and wish you all happy ppy landings. g