The agreement is of significance, as it will not only remove certain restrictions on European and India flights operating in each other's skies, but also strengthen the possibility of an open sky agreement between them.
"We are hoping that the summit will be an occasion to sign an agreement on civil aviation, which is a legal formality giving certainty to bilateral agreements between the EU member states and India. This will be a blanket agreement, as for a moment, the legality of the bilateral agreements could be challenged, because of the evolution of a common EU transport policy," Daniele Smadja, ambassador and the head of delegation of the European Commission to India, Nepal and Bhutan told reporters on the sidelines of an information seminar on the EU at Raichak near Kolkata.
"This agreement is now leaving open the possibility to negotiate for an open sky agreement, liberalizing air traffic," she added.
The EU will also provide technical assistance package programme of 12.5 million Euros, under the agreement. Most importantly, the deal will remove nationality restrictions in the bilateral air services agreements between India and the EU countries.
Under the agreement, if one EU member country operates lesser number of flights than it has been allowed, another country covered under the bilateral deal with India, can use its traffic rights, said Smajda.
Recently, the EU entered the first phase of an open sky agreement with the US, by signing Air Transport Agreement, which has replaced 21 bilateral agreements between the EU member states and the US. European airlines are now able to fly without restrictions from any point in the EU to any point in the US, thereby removing all restrictions on routes, prices, or the number of weekly flights.
The EU has also entered into a similar agreement with China.
The agreement with India will be the thirty-fourth "horizontal" aviation agreement negotiated by the European Commission (EC). In total, nearly 700 bilateral air services agreements between EU Member States and partner countries around the world have been brought into conformity with EU law.
The horizontal aviation agreement with India would not invalidate the 26 India-EU bilateral agreements, but only give an umbrella cover to the agreements.
However, if the EU and India sign an open sky agreement, the bilateral agreements would cease to exist, explained Smajda. However, such an agreement would need European Commission's mandate, apart from that of the Indian government. The EU and India w ill discuss EU-India maritime transport agreement and free trade agreement in France.
