Delhi airport plans levying higher charges for grounded aircraft
Delhi airport operator DIAL plans to levy higher charges from airlines for grounded aircraft as they occupy available parking space and impact overall operational efficiency, amid rising instances of grounding of planes due to technical and other issues.
«We are planning that in the next traffic calculation, we are going to request that for people who are grounding (aircraft) here for more than a certain period, there should be some sort of higher charges because otherwise it disturbs the operations of other airlines,» Delhi International Airport Ltd (DIAL) CEO Videh Kumar Jaipuriar told PTI in an interview.
Jaipuriar, who is in charge of the country's largest airport, was responding to a query on whether the operator will look at levying higher charges from airlines for aircraft that are grounded at the airport.
The next traffic review of the airport is to happen early next year.
As many as 64 planes of various airlines, including IndiGo, SpiceJet and Air India, were grounded at the airport as of November 17, according to an airport spokesperson.
A total of 24 aircraft of IndiGo, 6 of SpiceJet, 2 of Air India and 1 of Alliance Air were on the ground, the spokesperson said.
Further, 23 planes of Go First, 5 of Zoom Air and 3 of Jet Airways remained grounded at the airport. All of them are currently non-operational airlines.
An official said the grounding of the aircraft was due to various reasons, including technical issues and some airlines going into insolvency proceedings.
