New Delhi: Airlines in India have agreed not to charge extra for seats after top officials of all airlines met at the Civil Aviation Ministry in New Delhi on Friday. Earlier, airlines had said they will charge extra if passengers wanted to book seats in advance. However, now they say they will only treat certain seats as privileged ones and charge extra for them.
The Civil Aviation Ministry asked all airlines to limit the number of 'privileged' seats for which they could charge a fee, with a few carriers imposing price tags on a very large number of them. The Ministry also asked them to identify the rows of seats to be charged, Civil Aviation Secretary KN Shrivastava said.
However, no upper limit was set on the number of privileged seats or was any time limit fixed for the airlines to take a decision on the issue. Shrivastava said after the hour-long meet that the airlines would report back within a week or ten days.
The Ministry also extended the deadline of reducing the number of foreign pilots to zero by three years till 2016 while asking the carriers to reduce the number of expatriates in their ranks and recruit more Indians holding the Commercial Pilot Licence (CPL), even as trainees, he said. Earlier, the deadline was set for this year....
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08:58 PM, May 17, 2013
The Central Bureau of Investigation has booked Airbus along with seven officials of erstwhile Indian Airlines for alleged irregularities in over Rs 8,000-crore deal for supplying 43 aircraft to the erstwhile carrier in 2005. CBI sources said the agency has booked French company Airbus Industries and seven officials which held senior positions in the Indian Airlines, which was later merged with the Air India. ...
08:45 PM, Mar 17, 2013
Alleging violation of weekly rest norms for the pilots by the airline, Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICAP) on Wednesday asked Air India CMD Rohit Nandan to take "stringent" action against those responsible for it. ...
03:45 AM, Dec 27, 2012
Two alleged Sikh militants, sent back to India in 2000 after serving a life term in Pakistan for hijacking an Air India plane to that country in 1981, have moved a Delhi court seeking stay of a fresh trial against them here for the same offence. The two, in their plea to Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Sameer Bajpai has said the trial in the case be stayed as the matter...
07:45 PM, Dec 11, 2012
Mumbai: A local court on Friday acquitted 19 persons, accused to have helped get fake passports for the hijackers of the Indian Airlines flight IC-814 in December 1999. In December 1999, Mumbai police's crime branch arrested Abdul Latif, an alleged terrorist, from suburban Jogeshwari and claimed to have recovered an AK-56 rifles, hand grenades and rocket launchers from him. According to police, he confessed to committing a bank robbery for...
10:41 PM, Oct 19, 2012
New Delhi: With rising costs, Indian carriers would operate 19 per cent less number of flights this winter compared to 2011, though no-frill airlines would put in more flights during the busy season starting this month-end. Full-service carriers, Air India and Jet Airways, along with their no-frill subsidiaries Alliance Air and JetLite, would operate less number of flights, while all no-frill airlines -- IndiGo, SpiceJet and GoAir, would significantly increase...
05:12 PM, Oct 17, 2012
New Delhi: Mehrajuddin Dand alias Javed, the alleged conspirator of the IC-814 hijack, is a resident of Sopore. He allegedly provided logistical support for the IC-814 hijacking of 1999. Sources say Mehrajuddin was operating since 1993. He was living in Nepal with a Hindu name and was also married there. He worked for several years for the IC-814 hijack accused Arshad Cheema, who was a Pakistani diplomat based in Kathmandu....
11:27 AM, Sep 13, 2012
Kishtwar: In a major breakthrough, the Jammu and Kashmir Police has arrested a terror suspect, Mehrajuddin Dand alias Javed, who allegedly provided logistical support for the hijacking of IC-814 in 1999. He allegedly provided travel papers to IC-814 hijackers. NIA officials are expected to go to Jammu and Kashmir to question Mehrajuddin soon. The alleged terrorist, who is linked to various terror activities including blasts across the country, was arrested...
08:07 AM, Sep 13, 2012
New Delhi: Conciliation talks between the Air India management and pilots, who went on a 58-day strike in support of their career progression issues, started on Tuesday. The parleys, which were held before the Deputy Chief Labour Commissioner, came in the backdrop of Delhi High Court asking both sides to hold talks on daily basis and report back to it on July 13. Sources said both sides stuck to their...
10:11 PM, Jul 10, 2012
New Delhi: The strike by a section of Air India pilots will on Monday enter the 57th day, to attain the notorious distinction of becoming the second longest strike in the country's aviation history. The Indian Pilots Guild (IPG), the union of Air India pilots, had also struck work in 1974 against cost cutting measures when fuel prices shot up alarmingly. The 1974 strike lasted for well over 90 days....
09:39 AM, Jul 02, 2012
New Delhi: Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh on Friday made public the Dharmadhikari Report and said that the demands of striking Air India pilots will be looked into only after they end their strike unconditionally. Singh also said that the ministry has set up a core panel to implement the recommendations of the Dharmadhikari report on the merger of Indian Airlines and Air India. There will be parity between the...
01:59 PM, Jun 01, 2012
New Delhi: Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh on Friday met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to discuss the Air India crisis. After the meeting, Ajit Singh said that the government was not being inflexible and was open to talks. "The government is not being inflexible or adamant," Ajit Singh said. The Aviation Minister also said that the government had no plans of imposing the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) against the...
12:43 PM, May 11, 2012
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain Air India's contempt petition against the Indian Pilots Guild and asked Air India to sit with pilots and sort out the differences. A bench headed by Justice T S Thakur said that they (pilots) have done nothing which amounts to contempt of court and suggested the airlines to speak with them to sort out the differences. "They have done nothing...
12:19 PM, May 11, 2012
New Delhi: What is the root cause of the current pilot crisis in Air India? It seems that one of the main reasons for the big battle is an aircraft, the Boeing Dreamliner, as two powerful pilot unions fight to fly the bird, even willing to kill the Maharaja. Air India pilots allege the management influenced by Indian Airlines pilots decided to give equal opportunity to both unions. The case...
09:07 PM, May 10, 2012
New Delhi: Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh has expressed regret over the Air India-Indian Airlines merger, saying the division was a mistake. Speaking to CNN-IBN, Ajit Singh said that in retrospect that decision did cause problems. "Their cultures were entirely different. Air India's way of doing things, Indian Airlines way of doing things, their pay scales, their promotion policies and their areas of operation were also entirely different. So that...
07:37 AM, May 10, 2012
Indian Pilots Guild President Jitendra Awhad said that the Air India pilots' strike was not indefinite. ...
11:29 AM, May 08, 2012
New Delhi: Taking a strong stand against striking pilots, the AIr India management has threatened action. The management said, "Striking pilots must return to work by 6 pm today or face action." Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh has also called the Air India pilots' strike 'inappropriate' and 'illegal' as around 100 pilots called in sick. "A strike needs a notice in advance. The Air India pilots have called in sick....
11:16 AM, May 08, 2012
New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Friday will deliver a verdict on a plea by a pilots' association of the former domestic carrier Indian Airlines, seeking parity with their counterparts at Air India. The pilots' have alleged that commanders of basic aircraft of former Indian Airlines have been overlooked for training of advanced aircraft like Boeing 747, 787 and 777. Meanwhile, the US Transportation Department has slapped a $...
08:46 AM, May 04, 2012
New Delhi: The government is likely to decide on a proposal to allow foreign carriers to invest in local airlines on Thursday. The government is likely to allow 49 per cent Foreign Direct Investment in the aviation sector. This will allow cash-strapped domestic airlines like Kingfisher to access funds more easily. Indian airlines have been battered by rising fuel costs, high taxes and fierce competition in a market where five...
07:24 AM, Apr 12, 2012
New Delhi: The government is likely to decide on a proposal to allow foreign carriers to invest in local airlines as early as Thursday, a senior government official said, which could provide a lifeline to cash-starved and debt-laden carriers like Kingfisher Airlines. "The decision is imminent," said the official at Department Of Industrial Policy and Promotion, referring to a proposal to allow foreign carriers to invest in local airlines. "It...
05:41 PM, Apr 10, 2012
