Delhi High Court issues notice to Jet Airways on plea for refund, alternative flights to passengers

Source: thehindu.com.

The Delhi High Court on May 1 issued notice to Jet Airways on a plea seeking refund or alternative mode of travel to passengers who had booked tickets with the airways which has shut all domestic and international flights.

The High Court additionally asked the Centre and the Directorate-General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to also respond to the plea by next date of hearing on July 16.

Activist Bejon Kumar Misra, in his application, said the sudden suspension of all flights of Jet Airways has resulted in a major crisis for the passengers who were not informed about it earlier.

The plea has sought direction to the Ministry of Civil Aviation and the DGCA to adopt prompt redress mechanism for all affected passengers to access full refund of air tickets with reasonable compensation or arrange alternative mode of travel for them to reach their destination.

“It is common knowledge that all competitor airlines have exorbitantly increased their airfares and the toothless and vulnerable consumers are constrained to suffer not only in terms of money, but also in terms of mental harassment of unprecedented scale,” the plea said.

“The passengers have to not only purchase alternative tickets at highly exorbitant cost, but also go through lots of anxieties and mental agony. This has resulted in profiteering by other airlines at the cost of the passengers and till date no relief has been announced by the respondents [Centre and DGCA],” it added.

“There is a complete chaotic aviation crisis looming over the country where the consumers/passengers are victim on account of absence of any robust and effective regulator in the aviation sector in India to regulate the functioning of the airlines in a fair and ethical manner in order to monitor and regulate airfares,” the plea said.

“It is submitted that as per the report available in the public domain, approximately more than ₹360 crore of the passengers/consumers hard earned money are under threat due to non-refund of the ticket value,” it said.