The Delhi High Court said it would not be appropriate to pass any directions for the capping of airfares across the country, on Wednesday.
High Court Denied To Put A Cap On Airfare
They have come to this conclusion by considering the fact that the airline industry is “very very competitive” and most of the players are going through “huge losses”.
A bench of Acting Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Manmeet PS Arora said, “Market forces will decide the pricing of tickets. The industry is doing very well today. You look at any airline flying today, it is a highly competitive industry. An auto rickshaw fare is more than the airline fare today.”
It appears that the court has disposed of two petitions seeking regulation of pricing of flight tickets and said it would pass a detailed order.
According to the bench,”Today the industry is very very competitive. You will find those who are running airlines are into huge losses.”
No Need To Change The Economic Dynamics
Further adding that the huge investment is coming in this sector and “let’s not make it more regulated. It is a well-controlled sector. Every industry which is doing well need not be tampered with.”
The bench said that the stray incidents will not require the court to entertain public interest litigations (PIL) on the issue and bring the entire sector under any new regulation.
The above-mentioned two PILs were filed by advocate Amit Sahni and consumer rights activist Bejon Misra, through lawyer Shashank Deo Sudhi.
In these PILs, petitioners urged the court to pass directions to cap airfares across the country so that customers are not “fleeced arbitrarily” by airlines.
In response to this the counsel for the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) opposed the plea and submitted that the airfares depend on the routes as well as the availability of planes and sometimes there are very few passengers in the aircraft and yet they fly.
So far, India has a fleet of 771 commercial aircraft.
There will be a 250% surge in capacity despite accounting for 200 replacement aircraft by all the airlines.
