(a) whether the Indian Airlines are loosing crores of rupees on Aviation Fuel due to the connivance between Air Traffic Control Officials and the Private Airlines;
(b) if so, whether, any such complaints have come to the notice of the Government during the last three years;
(c) if so, the details thereof; and
(d) the action taken by the Government against the erring officials and the remedial steps taken to check the situation?
THE MINISTER OF CIVIL AVIATION ( SHRI SYED SHAHNAWAZ HUSSAIN )
(a): There have been occasions when incoming flights were put to hold and departing aircraft made to wait at holding point for a longer period or desired flight levels not allocated to Indian Airlines flights by Air Traffic Control (ATC). This results in consumption of extra fuel.
(b),(c) and (d): The details of the three such instances which recently came to the notice of the Government were looked into. The details are as follows:-
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(i) A complaint was received through Press Clipping entitled `IA loss is ATC officials` gain` dated 7th January, 2002 of the Asian Age. It was alleged that ATC at Ahmedabad was having understanding with pilots of private airlines and the Indian Airlines` flights are put `on hold` in the air. The matter has been investigated and it was found that the complaint was baseless. Ahmedabad Airport is equipped with the state-of-art MSSR Radar. The traffic density at Ahmedabad Airport is very low and all the aircraft are provided radar services both in the Approach Control and Area Control. Ahmedabad ATC is maintaining safe, orderly and expeditious flow of air traffic. No complaint has, however, been received from any airlines in this regard.
(ii) The other complaint was received from Indian Airlines that on 3rd January, 2002 at IGI Airport, Sahara Airlines flight 302 was given preference in departure over their flight IC-401. This has been investigated. The taxi routing of Sahara Airlines was shorter than the taxi routing of Indian Airlines flight IC-401. Sahara was cleared for departure first as it was to fly at higher level than Indian Airlines flight. This was done to facilitate maximum number of departures with least over all delay.
(iii) Indian Airlines brought it to the notice of Airports Authority of India (AAI) that their aircraft operating flight IC-813 on 4.1.2002 was asked by Delhi ATC to hold position to adjust the departure of another flight. This matter has been enquired into. The factual position is that this incident involved Air India flight 316. Since Air India flight 316 was to fly at a higher level, Air India was allowed to depart ahead of Indian Airlines flight IC-813 and they were both flying on the same route.