Sudden spurt in airfares: Govt to tighten noose

November 29, 2012
indianaviation

New Delhi, November 29: The freedom of airlines to charge public at their whim may soon be over with the Aviation Ministry planning to announce a more rationalised fare structure in a fortnight and keep a strict vigil on sudden and unexpected rise in airfare.

In the long run, the Ministry is also planning to have a regulatory mechanism to monitor fares, implying the demand and supply mechanism to determine airfares may also come to an end.

The move comes in the wake of an exorbitant rise in airfares during Diwali this year. On Diwali-eve, the economy class tickets from Mumbai to Kolkata went up between Rs 35,000 and Rs 43,000, while business class tickets were sold for as high as Rs 60,000.

Similar problems were faced in almost all metro routes prompting Aviation Minister Ajit Singh to order an inquiry into the matter. Now, the Ministry is planning to tighten the regulatory mechanism to monitor fares.

“Our focus right now is to maintain and rationalise the fares. This we are going to announce in the next fortnight,” Aviation Secretary K N Srivastava told Deccan Herald.

The Aircraft Act too provides for regulatory mechanism to monitor fares. “This is the proposal we will be considering as a long-run measure,” Srivastava said. He, however, maintained that the regulatory mechanism to monitor airfares needed to be deliberated at length before implementation.

The airfares are generally decided on the basis of “bucket system” provided by an airline to the aviation regulator DGCA. Airlines have a system of putting seats in different fare buckets and the fares rise from within the bucket as the aircraft gets filled.

But, when there is a heavy demand, specially during the festive season, the fares often exceed the bucket by a huge margin. This happened during this Diwali when the fares in most of the routes shot up by 15 per cent over the last Diwali spurt.

Srivastava said that the Aviation Ministry will also soon have a monitoring unit attached to it. All airlines will be duty-bound to inform this unit alongwith the DGCA on the fares they charge on a daily basis.


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News Network
May 21,2020

Kolkata, May 21: Around 300 nurses have left Kolkata for Manipur after resigning from their jobs, said JS Joyrita, Deputy Residence Commissioner, Manipur Bhavan, Kolkata on Wednesday.

"Around 60 more nurses will be leaving tomorrow. We are getting many calls from people who want to go back to Manipur," she said.

Earlier, it was reported that 185 nurses have quit their job from hospitals in Kolkata and returned to Imphal. Cristella, a nurse said: "We are not happy that we left our duties. But we faced discrimination, racism and people sometimes spit on us. Lack of PPE kits, and people used to question us everywhere we went."

According to the latest information available on the website of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, 2961 cases of the virus have been reported from West Bengal 1074 cured/migrated/discharged and 250 deaths.

India's COVID-19 tally reached 1,06,750 on Wednesday, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. As many as 140 deaths have been reported in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of deaths to 3,303. Out of the total cases, 61,149 are actives cases and 42,298 patients have been cured/discharged/migrated.

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News Network
May 24,2020

New Delhi, May 24: India witnessed the biggest ever spike of 6,767 positive cases in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of COVID-19 cases to 1,31,868, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

As many as 147 deaths have been reported in the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 3,867.
Out of the total number of cases, 73,560 are active and 54,440 have been cured/discharged and one migrated.

Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-affected state with 47,190 COVID-19 cases. It is followed by Tamil Nadu (15,512), Gujarat (13,664), and Delhi (12,910).

The nationwide lockdown imposed as a precautionary measure to contain the spread of COVID-19 has been extended till May 31.

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News Network
April 2,2020

New Delhi,  Apr 2: Muslim cleric Imam Umer Ilyasi appealed to all the individuals who attended Tablighi Jamaat congregation at Nizamuddin Markaz in Delhi recently, not to hide from the government and not to be scared of it.

"I appeal to all the Muslim brothers and mosque managing committees involved in the Jamaat congregation to please come out and inform the government. You do not need to feel scared of the government," Ilyasi told news agency.

He added: "You do not need to feel scared of the government. If you are quarantined, it doesn't mean you will be punished. This is for your and other people's safety."
On the subject of people likely to be quarantined, he said that if one does get quarantined, he or she must not think those quarantine facilities are jails. "If you are quarantined, it doesn't mean you will be punished. This is for your and other people's safety. Quarantine is the cure, you do not need to worry about it," he added.

Ilyasi further appealed to the people that one must not associate religion with the coronavirus outbreak. "Islam talks about saving one person's life and securing a person's life. Do not connect the outbreak with religion as this outbreak does not affect any religion or caste in particular," he said.

With regards to the lockdown being imposed by the centre, he said: "I appeal to all that we must obey the lockdown judiciously as there is no medicine or cure for this disease."
The Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare's latest bulletin said that there are 1,834 coronavirus positive cases in India, including 1,649 active cases, 144 cured/discharged/migrated people and 41 deaths.

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