No country for flyers: Air passengers are being taken for granted by airlines

Indian aviation is on a roll. Passenger traffic is increasing and profits are soaring. Crisil Ratings expects operating profit of the industry to grow over 20% next financial year, after a neartripling this year. Everyone’s having a good time save one group: passengers. They are an afterthought, taken for granted by airlines and, it sometimes appears, by govt.

Shocking negligence | An 80-year-old man collapsed this week at Mumbai airport and died. He had pre-booked a wheelchair on an Air India flight but didn’t get one because of shortage. He walked, with tragic consequences. How can there be a shortage when a wheelchair has been pre-booked? Regulations say it’s an airline’s obligation to provide assistance to people with disabilities or reduced mobility.

Not isolated | This is not a one-off. For months, passenger complaints have mounted. Airlines have violated contractual obligations, not bothered to give timely information on cancellations during peak season. We recently had frustrated passengers in Mumbai airport sitting on the runway to eat.

Lame excuses | The preferred excuse of aviation companies and GOI officials is that there are infra constraints because passenger traffic has exceeded pre-Covid levels. Wasn’t it a normal outcome of mobility constraints being removed and return of normalcy?

Missing regulatory action | GOI pulled out all stops to help the aviation industry, which was severely affected by Covid. For a while even a floor price for tickets was fixed. The same level of attentiveness is not extended to passengers. Aviation regulator DGCA concentrates mainly on operational safety. It did issue a show cause notice to Air India, but recurring offences suggest India doesn’t have an institutional mechanism that’s effective enough.

Domestic aviation today is a near-duopoly. Lack of competition and an inattentive regulator make for miserable passenger experience.

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