CIC questions Civil Av Min on international routes to airlines

The Central Information Commission has directed the Civil Aviation Ministry to disclose reasons for allotting international routes to Indian operators.
The directive came on the plea of one Mukesh Yadav who was denied the information by the Ministry as it contended that disclosure of file notings would expose the commercial secrets of the operators and compromise their competitive position.
"... The note-sheets contain information supplied by Indian carriers with reference to their business plans and include commercial confidence, trade secrets or intellectual property," the ministry had claimed before the panel.
It also claimed that SpiceJet did not agree to the disclosure of information.

Yadav strongly put his arguments saying he only sought copies of the file notings as he wanted to be informed about the decision making process and the reasoning behind allocating traffic rights to certain airlines.
He said appellate authority in the ministry refused to disclose the reasoning behind allocating international traffic rights to Indian operators.

"Notings reflect the decision making process and reasoning cannot contain any information pertaining to commercial confidence, trade secrets or intellectual property. It is the decision making process and the basis of granting traffic rights to certain airlines and not to others," he said.
Information Commissioner Sushma Singh agreed with Yadav and directed the Ministry to disclose copies of note sheets which give "reasons and basis for allocation of traffic rights to operate international routes to Indian carriers for Summer 2012 and Winter 2012-13."

She, however, allowed to sever the information which might be detrimental to commercial interests of the airlines.