No-fly rules: Centre to debar high-risk' fliers; list spares cabin crew

Kochi: In a move described by the government as "unique and first-of-its- kind in the world", India on Friday "unveiled rules to tackle on-board disruptive and unruly behaviour by passengers" with "immediate effect". Unfortunately, however, these will not cover misbehaviour by the cabin crew, which is becoming rampant. With the no-fly rules not covering misbehaviour by the cabin crew, concerns are rising that airlines and their crews can put the blame on passengers despite misbehaving with them.

In response to a question, civil aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju said if passengers are aggrieved with the behaviour of the cabin crew, they can always complain at the ministry’s "Air Sewa" web portal , an integrated platform on which air passengers can lodge grievances against all major stakeholders in the aviation sector, including airlines and their employees. The government monitors such complaints and takes it up with the airline concerned, which has to conduct a probe. If found guilty, the crew can be grounded or even sacked. Passengers also have the option of directly complaining to aviation regulator DGCA about cabin crew misbehaviour. There will be also be a two-stage process of determining offences and appeals as per the no-fly rules, under which passengers accused of unruly behaviour can get a fair hearing and present their case. Such passengers can also call other passengers on that flight to testify in their favour, the government has assured.

In fact, one passenger who faced flight delays of several hours long at Srinagar airport a few months ago told this newspaper how the cabin crew of that airline snarled at upset passengers and appeared unapologetic about the flight delays. "Such cabin crew may now be tempted to further bully passengers," the passenger said. "A total of 1,788 grievances have been registered on Air Sewa web portal/mobile app till March this year, out of which 1,148 pertain to airlines and 446 to airports and the rest to other stakeholders," the government had told Pariament in March this year.

The government said Friday: "The complaint of unruly behaviour will need to be filed by the pilot-in-command. These complaints will be probed by an internal committee to be set up by the airline (on whose flight the passenger allegedly misbehaved). The committee will have a retired district and sessions judge as chairman and representatives from a different scheduled airline, passengers’ association/consumers’ association/retired officers of consumer disputes redressal forums as members. As per the Civil Aviation Regulation (CAR) provisions, the internal committee will have to decide the matter within 30 days, and also specify the duration of ban on the unruly passenger. During the period of pendency of the inquiry, the concerned airline may impose a ban on that passenger."

But if the passenger is aggrieved at the decision, he/she can appeal to a higher authority. The ministry added: "The revised CAR also contains appeal provisions against the ban. Aggrieved persons (other than those identified as a security threat by the MHA) may appeal within 60 days from the date of issue of the order to the appellate committee constituted by MoCA." Meanwhile, the names of passengers found to be unruly will be forwarded by the respective airlines to a "national no-fly list" that will be maintained by aviation regulator DGCA. The flying ban penalties for endangering "aviation safety" will vary from three months to lifetime. Flyers found to have indulged in "life-threatening" behaviour could be banned for life. However, it will be optional for airlines to see if they want to ban those passengers from flying whose names figure on the no-fly list. But those seen as a national security risk by the home ministry can also be separately put on the no-fly list on grounds of security, in which case all domestic airlines will have to ban such a passenger, and in such cases the two-stage process of determining offence and appeals will not be followed.