The Supreme Court issued a notice to the Union Ministry of Civil Aviation on a petition which sought airlines, both domestic and international, to refund the full amount of the tickets in relation to all flights cancelled due to the nationwide lockdown.A bench headed by Justice N.V. Ramana and comprising Justices S.K. Kaul and B.R. Gavai, while hearing the matter through video conferencing,...
The Supreme Court issued a notice to the Union Ministry of Civil Aviation on a petition which sought airlines, both domestic and international, to refund the full amount of the tickets in relation to all flights cancelled due to the nationwide lockdown.
A bench headed by Justice N.V. Ramana and comprising Justices S.K. Kaul and B.R. Gavai, while hearing the matter through video conferencing, made an oral observation and stated that the non-refund on the tickets booked for air travel after lockdown was “arbitrary”.
The plea had been moved by Pravasi Legal Cell urging the top Court to declare non-refund of the amount of the tickets by airlines as illegal and violative of the Civil Aviation Requirement issued by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). The petitioner contended that airlines, instead of providing full refund of the amount collected for cancelled tickets, are providing a credit shell, valid up to one year.
The plea cited the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MCA) April 16 office memorandum, which directed all airline operators to refund the full amount collected for all tickets booked during the first phase of the lockdown period, from March 25 to April 14, for domestic and international air travel.
The MCA memorandum said if a passenger seeks refund during the first lockdown phase for travel during the second lockdown period (from April 15 to May 3), still the airline has to refund the full amount without levying any cancellation charges.
The plea contended that the Office Memorandum leaves out the vast majority of passengers who had booked tickets before the flight operations were banned, and thus indirectly approves the practice of the airlines providing a credit shell for booking affected before the lockdown, though the same clearly violates the refund rules of the DGCA.
However, the petitioner cited the government directive only that orders the airlines to refund those tickets, which were booked during the lockdown period and leaves out passengers who book tickets before the restrictions were placed.
According to Justice S.K. Kaul, the relief should be entitled to everyone whose flight was cancelled because of lockdown extension, irrespective of the period of booking.
The bench has sought a response from the Civil Aviation Ministry and the DGCA.