OPEN SKY POLICY & CURRENT SCENARIO

OPEN SKY POLICY

The Open-sky policy came in April 1990. The policy allowed air taxi- operators to operate flights from any airport, both on a charter and a non charter basis and to decide their own flight schedules, cargo and passenger fares. The operators were, however, required to use aircraft with a minimum of 15 seats and conform to the prescribed rules. In 1990, the private air taxi-operators carried 15,000 passengers. This number increased to 4.1 lakh in 1992, 29.2 lakh in 1993, 36 lakh in 1994 and 48.9 lakh in 1995.

The 1996, private air taxi operators carried 49.08 lakh passengers which amounted to a 41.14 per cent share in the domestic air passenger traffic. Seven operators viz NEPC Airlines, Skyline NEPC, Jet Air, Archana Airways, Sahara India Airlines, Modiluft and East West Airlines have since acquired the status of scheduled airlines. Besides this there were 22 nonscheduled private operators and 34 private operators holding no-objection certificate in 1996. The number of plus 120 category aircraft in the private sector was 34 and the total fleet strength was 75 in June, 1996. Two out of seven scheduled air taxi operators suspended their operations in 1996 because of the non-availability of aircraft. By 1995, several private airlines had ventured into the aviation business and accounted for more than 10 percent of the domestic air traffic. These included Jet Airways Sahara, NEPC Airlines, East West Airlines, ModiLuft Airlines, Jagsons Airlines, Continental Aviation, and Damania Airways. But only Jet Airways and Sahara managed to survive the competition. Meanwhile, Indian Airlines, which had dominated the Indian air travel industry, began to lose market share to Jet Airways and Sahara. Today, Indian aviation industry is dominated by private airlines and these include low cost carriers such as

Deccan Airlines, GoAir, SpiceJet etc, who have made air travel affordable.

CURRENT SCENARIO

The Indian aviation industry is one of the fastest growing aviation industries in the world with private airlines accounting for more than 75 per cent of the sector of the domestic aviation market (as of 2006). The industry is growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18 per cent. The country has 454 airports and airstrips, of which 16 are designated as international airports.

Currently, India ranks ninth in the global civil aviation market.

Passengers carried by domestic airlines from January-June 2010 stood at 25.71 million as against 21.1 million in the corresponding period of 2009—a growth of 22 per cent—according to data released by the

Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). In terms of market share, private carrier Jet Airways was the market leader with 26.5 per cent share, followed by Kingfisher Airlines with 21 per cent, Air India with 16.9 per cent, Indigo with 16.4 per cent, SpiceJet with 13.3 per cent and GoAir with 5.8 per cent during the month of June 2010

The AAI is set to spend over US$ 1.02 billion in 2010, towards modernization of non-metro airports. AAI is planning the city-side development of 24 airports, including those at Ahmedabad and Amritsar. Additionally, 11 new greenfield airports have been identified to reduce passenger load on existing airports, according to Praveen Seth, member-operations, AAI. AAI also plans to spend around US$ 3.07 billion in the next five years for developing, upgrading and modernising metro and non-metro airports.

With the growth in the industry, airport retailing has also gained pace in the recent times. Development of new terminals and airports such as the recently inaugurated T3 in New Delhi has provided added impetus to this segment.