New Delhi : With the Civil Aviation Ministry resolving fewer passenger complaints than expected, the number of pending grievances at the end of July surged to 2,090, the highest monthly pendency in the current year.
The Ministry’s monthly performance data showed that it settled 1,578 grievances in July, 2021 while 2,090 kept pending adding to the woes of flyers.
Aviation Ministry sources said that majority of the complaints filed online pertain to issues related to refunds and flight cancellations.
Country’s top aviation safety expert Captain Mohan Ranganathan said that government does not really pay attention to the passenger problems and rarely acts against erring airlines.
“In case of passenger complaints, they (government) generally send a letter or message to the airline and reply to the passenger that the issue has been resolved. It’s all box ticking exercise and no action,” he told UNI.
While noting that the regulations with regards to passenger protection were very weak in the country, Ranganathan recalled that in 90s there was a complaint against Damania (Airways) that people were drinking onboard and the then flight safety director grounded the airline for one month.
“This sent a message to other airlines but you will not see such actions now,” he said.
The publicly available document on the Ministry website showed the number of pending public grievances in the month of May and June was 752 and 912 respectively but skyrocketed in July suggesting sluggish remedial action.
Club One Air CEO Rajan Mehra feels that a lot of complaints could be related to the opening of international flights as people now want to fly out to visit their family and friends.
- Latest
