Bad news for air passengers! Govt rules out capping of airline fares

New Delhi: Capping of airfares in the backdrop of passenger complaints of arbitrary tariff hikes was ruled out by the government on Thursday, which said that competition among the airlines will take care of the problem.

Civil aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju said restricting the air fares will not make good business sense as it could also jeopardise the government's regional connectivity plan as such a move may discourage airlines to fly on non-profitable routes.

He, however, said a slew of passenger-centric measures including "time-bound" grievance redressal mechanism would be unveiled very soon, emphasizing that India's civil aviation market was the fastest growing in domestic passenger travel demand.

It is expected that the government was going to announce steps to rationalize the ticket cancellation charges and they are likely to be capped around the base fare, as against current exorbitant fees, as part of passenger-friendly initiatives.

The minister said at least 32 airports built by Airport Authority of India at a cost of at least Rs 3,000 crore over the years were lying "unconnected" and putting any restriction on market-driven fares may jeopardize government's plan to start flight services to those airports.

Holding that putting a cap on air fares may have an adverse impact on growth of aviation sector, Raju said his ministry keeps a "continuous tab" on price movements to ensure that the rates are under check.

His comments come at a time when the government is discussing ways to address issues related to steep fluctuations in airfares, especially during peak seasons and natural calamities. Minister of state for civil aviation Mahesh Sharma last month had announced that capping of fares will be announced soon.

"These (capping airfares) are complicated problems. They don't have simplistic solutions ... Competition has by and large taken care of the (ticket) rates," Raju told PTI in an interview.

"Floors and caps go together. If you just say I will only cap (air ticket prices) then you won't have any airline. Anyone doing business doesn't want to make loss," he said.

India's domestic aviation market has clocked a growth rate of 22 percent in the last one year, the highest for any country.