The government has decided to plug an existing loophole in the civil aviation guidelines that allows domestic airlines to report high compliance with the North-Eastern Region (NER) flying quota without undertaking actual flying into the region. At present,an airline could end a flight in the commercially viable destination of Bagdogra,West Bengal,to meet the 10 per cent NER connectivity quota. However,airlines will soon have to make additional flights into the poorly connected region. In a recent meeting between the civil aviation ministry and development of Northeast region (DoNER) ministry,the two sides decided to remove Bagdogra from the list of destinations that airlines could fly to meet their NER connectivity quota. Private airlines have been taking advantage of this loophole and have avoided flying into NER. Now,the government has taken an in-principle decision to drop Bagdogra,until now considered part of the NER region,from the list of destinations for meeting the NER flying quota, said a senior government official. The government will evaluate the technical feasibility before it notifies the decision. Meanwhile,domestic airlines will be given some grace period to adjust their future flying schedules accordingly,the official added. The move will considerably impact private airlines and will bring down their compliance from the current levels if Bagdogra is excluded, said a senior airline official,on condition of anonymity. Barring the state-owned carrier,Air India which receives some subsidy from the Northeast Council for flying on the unprofitable routes none of the private airlines provide connectivity to all 11 destinations in the region. As per the latest winter schedules filed with a civil aviation body,five private airlines Kingfisher Airlines including Kingfisher Red,Go Air,Jet Airways and SpiceJet fly into Bagdogra. While no-frills carriers like Go Air and SpiceJet operate flights to just a single destination in the region,IndiGo and JetLite fly to four cities each. Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines (including its subsidiary Kingfisher Red) fly to three and nine NER destinations respectively. However,airlines reported high compliance with the 10 per cent quota in 2009,as per the Directorate General of Civil Aviation. Against the mandatory 10 per cent,Kingfisher Airlines reported 25.4 per cent compliance,Go Air 23.4 per cent,the Jet Airways-combine 16.2 per cent,SpiceJet 13.2 per cent and IndiGo 11 per cent. According to route dispersal guidelines,domestic airlines are required to deploy in the NER,Jammu and Kashmir,Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep (Category-II routes) at least 10 per cent of their deployed capacity on metro routes (Category-I routes).
