IndiGo did not comply with new aviation panel guidelines

Submitting financial details, intended use of aircraft among other details AAC seeks

Clearing the air, the civil aviation ministry said today that IndiGo airlines did not comply with the guidelines of the new Aircraft Acquisition Committee (AAC) and hence the approval for the acquisition of only 5 planes was given as against the proposal of 16 Airbus 320s.

At the first meeting of new Aircraft Acquisition Committee in November, 2012, the ministry was earlier rejecting IndiGo’s proposal for the acquisition of 16 aircraft. However, permission was granted to the carrier as IndiGo cited financial trouble in case, it did not acquire 5 aircraft. Moreover, IndiGo informed the ministry that it required only 5 aircraft for the time being, said a senior government official.

The civil aviation ministry is about to come out with new Route Dispersal Guidelines (RDG) in February. When IndiGo applies again, we will obviously consider its request, the official added.

Responding to the emailed query sent by Business Standard to IndiGo just evoked this response “Please give us time to respond”. However, no response came till the press time. Even an sms sent to Aditya Ghosh, President of IndiGo airlines, did not evoke any response.

The new Aircraft Acquisition Committee (AAC) guidelines ask for certain details from the carrier which applies for the aircraft acquisition. The airline is supposed to give these details to the ministry: financial details, intended use of the aircraft to various destinations, deployment of the flights according to the passenger traffic projections, assurance of the scheduled delivery of the aircraft.

Earlier, the AAC was approving of aircraft acquisition for next 5-6 years, but this new AAC gives approval for next 2-3 years. The payments and discounts given to the carriers by aircraft manufacturers vary according to the time frame in which the delivery has to be made.

In 2011, even before Ajit Singh, civil aviation minister took charge of the ministry; the civil aviation minister was given the power to sanction aircraft import.

The aircraft acquisition committee was first constituted by an executive order in 1994. In 2003, it was made an empowered committee. Two years later, it was given re commendatory powers in respect to acquisition of new airlines and in 2011 the power to sanction aircraft import of scheduled airlines was given to the civil aviation minister.

On November 29, Singh told Business Standard, "I am not chairing the committee. We have decided to streamline the acquisition process fixing timelines for the approval process and in process removed certain anomalies. I am not taking away anybody's powers. It is committee formed by the ministry. It is not a statutory body. Even earlier it had recommendatory powers in certain respects.”

In its press release issued by the Civil Aviation Ministry in October, it said that the committee will consider, examine and make recommendations on all proposals for providing air transport services and for permitting import or acquisition of aircraft for various purposes.  Along with this, the procedure for consideration and approval of applications has also been streamlined significantly with timelines stipulated for various stages of processing. The new addition to the committee was HS Khosla, former director general of civil aviation.