Airlines like Jet Airways, Indi-Go, SpiceJet & Air India seek more lenient norms to fly abroad

NEW DELHI: India’s airlines appear to have dropped their opposition to scrapping the current norms for operating international flights and have sought greater leniency in the proposed system of earning domestic flying credits to determine eligibility to fly overseas.

Resistance by Jet Airways, Indi-Go, SpiceJet and Air India to the removal of the eligibility norms to fly abroad seems to have died out.

None of them present at a meeting last Wednesday opposed the move to replace the minimum requirement of five years of operations and 20 aircraft, known as the 5/20 rule, sources who attended told ET.

The carriers, however, sought more flexible norms for the new regime based on credits earned for flying local routes, classified into three categories. Continuation of the 5/20 model would have affected Vistara and AirAsia, which started operating flights in India recently.

“None of the carriers opposed the move to bring in a new formula to fly international. They, however, discussed the issue of making it a little more lenient,” said a source present at the meeting.

Representatives from Jet Airways, Vistara and SpiceJet raised their concerns at the meeting, whereas IndiGo and AirAsia did not talk, the source added. The representative from the Federation of Indian Airlines, a body that constitutes Jet Airways, IndiGo, SpiceJet and GoAir, sought time till March 31 to reply with its views and it was granted.

Under the proposed regime, airlines will have to accumulate credits by earning points for seats operated on 20 key trunk routes (Category I), the number of passengers flown to the northeast, Lakshwadeep and the Andaman & Nicobar Islands and difficult airports in hill states such as Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand (Category II and IIA), and seats offered on all other routes ( Category III).

Airlines accumulating 300 domestic flying credits will be eligible to fly long-haul international flights, while 600 credits will be needed to operate short-haul international flights.

“You have limited them by laws like 5/20. Our potential itself is not quantified because of these restrictions. Our laws are restricting our players. If regulations are going to stifle growth, what is the need of those regulations? We want everything to become vibrant,” Raju had told ET in an interview in November.

The minister is learnt have signed a proposal to abolish 5/20 but that was rolled back due to opposition from existing airlines and a formula was proposed.

“Jet Airways raised concern on revenue seats being used to calculate points on these routes (Category II and IIA). Airlines cannot be penalised for less number of people flying on these routes. Airlines can operate flights but cannot ensure that the flights are flying full,” said a source present at the meeting.

SpiceJet wanted more points for operating flights on Category III routes. The proposal offers one point per available seat km operated on these sectors, the same as for Category I routes. Category II and IIA routes earn 3 and 5 points, respectively, per revenue passenger flown.

AirAsia opposed the proposed norms on two counts — allowing only long-haul international flights initially and the complexity of the whole model. “I would more easily understand cricket’s Duckworth-Lewis method than this,” AirAsia Global CEO Tony Fernandes said in Hyderabad on Saturday.