Air India should obey SC ticket-refund order: Legal consumer organisations
National carrier Air India is continuing to protect the air ticket money of passengers affected due to the lockdown, even after the deadline of March 31, 2021.
National carrier Air India is continuing to protect the air ticket money of passengers affected due to the lockdown, even after the deadline of March 31, 2021. The Supreme Court had, on October 1 last year, issued an order directing all airlines to provide full refund to passengers and allowed only airlines facing financial issues to refund or provide credit shells till March 2021.
“The face-value of the ticket is protected against any travel planned in future by the passengers. To provide reassurance and comfort to passengers during the pandemic days, Air India had extended the validity of tickets till March 31, 2021. However, as it was observed that the Covid situation was continuing, the validity for all tickets was further extended up to December 31, 2021, by a circular dated June 17, 2020,” the airline spokesperson said in response to the paper’s query.
“While Air India extended benefits to passengers in the form of name, however, Air India has never offered a credit shell to passengers due to its specific system configuration. Hence, the concept of credit shell is not applicable for Air India’s domestic and international passengers,” the spokesperson said.
Air India also said that based on continuous feedback from the passengers, additional facilities like change of sector, name dates were added.
“It may be noted that unlike some other airlines, Air India did not sell any inventory during the lockdown period. Such extension of validity of tickets was also approved for travel on Vande Bharat Mission flights,” added the airline spokesperson.
However, the airline did not comment when asked if they had taken SC’s permission for continuing to give benefits to passengers even after the Apex court’s order.
Paragraph 13 A(d) of the refund order states that by the end of March 2021, the airlines should refund cash to the holder of the credit shell.
“As per the Supreme Court order there is no differentiation between Air India and private airlines or domestic and international airlines. The order is crystal clear and states that all airlines are supposed to refund passengers immediately. However, the airlines who are undergoing financial crisis can, for the tickets that are booked during the lockdown, issue credit shells for a period up to March 31, 2021. It is the duty of the airline to return their money with interest now. There is no way and means that the airline can give other benefits or credit shells to the passengers. No circular, as mentioned by the airline, is above the Apex court’s order. Air India has to get permission from the court for still issuing credit otherwise it is contempt of court,” said Jose Abraham, president of Pravasi Legal Cell, who filed the matter in the SC.
Advocate Shirish Deshpande, chairman of Mumbai Grahak Panchayat (MGP), said, “In short, Air India admits it has decided to utilise crores of lakhs of passengers’ money without their consent which is in flagrant violation of the letter and spirit of the Supreme Court order dated October 1, 2020. Air India, being the national carrier, is also “state” under Indian Constitution and as such has special obligations towards passengers. If Air India persists with such a policy of denial of legitimate refund of lakhs of passengers, MGP will be constrained to approach the Supreme Court once again for ensuring strict compliance by Air India. Air India needs to be reminded that it’s not above the law of the land and there cannot be a separate rule of refund for Air India in any circumstances.”