TLI Staff
New Delhi: Days before the Lockdown 2.0 comes to end on May 3, the nodal Civil Aviation Ministry has started weighing various options to resume domestic flights in the country.
Among the suggestions to re-open the crucial air transport is allowing limited operations and identify states where flights could be permitted. To start with, airlines could be allowed to fill up only 25-30 per cent of the seats.
Sources told Top Lead India that aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has consulted premier hospital AIIMS, New Delhi to determine safe distance for sitting in the flight.
In its suggestion for Business Continuity Plan, aviation security watchdog Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) had suggested to keep the middle seat vacant to maintain social distancing norms. It also proposed to keep the last three rows in aircraft empty for maintaining isolation in case a passenger onboard is found to have Coronavirus symptoms.
“The decision can’t be taken by the Aviation Ministry alone. It has to be decided in consultation with other ministries such as health and road transport,” a person familiar with the development said.
Since local transportation is key for reaching airport or moving from airport to final destination, the Aviation Ministry is consulting concerned stakeholders.
While it is not clear that government would lift lockdown from May 4, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has indicated that opening economic activities are no less important than saving lives. This has rekindled hope of lifting, often termed as most draconian, lockdown.
There is, however, possibility that Centre may extend the lockdown for two more weeks as Coronavirus cases have surged in the recent days. The total count is now nearing 32,000 with almost 1,000 deaths reported from across the country as on Wednesday.
Factoring in the possibility of lockdown extension by a week or so, low-cost airlines SpiceJet and GoAir have opened forward booking and started selling tickets for flights departing from May 16. The other major private carriers IndiGo and Vistara have opened bookings from June 1.
The airlines have gone ahead with booking tickets even as such directive is awaited from the Aviation Ministry or DGCA.
“In case, lockdown is extended beyond May 16 we would refund to our customers,” said an airline executive.
Alongside airlines, airport operators are also preparing to open the facility for scheduled passenger flights.
Accordingly, they would start with fewer staff in the beginning and deploy additional manpower only after assessing the ground situation.
Industry insiders said that private airports could ask staff to come alternate week and plan to start operations with 50 per cent strength.