The Supreme Court Monday sought responses from the Centre and Ministry of Civil Aviation and Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on a plea seeking directions to airlines, both domestic and international, to refund the full amount of the tickets due to cancellation of flights in wake of the national lockdown.
A bench headed by Justice N.V. Ramana and comprising Justices S.K. Kaul and B.R. Gavai, heard the petition through video conferencing and observed that the non-refund on the tickets booked for air travel after lockdown was "arbitrary."
"It does seem arbitrary that refunds are being issued only to those who booked tickets after the lockdown was enforced. The relief should be entitled to everyone whose flights were cancelled due to lockdown”, remarked Justice S K Kaul.
The petition filed by NGO Pravasi Legal Cell urged the top court that non-refund of the amount of the tickets by airlines was illegal and violative of the Civil Aviation Requirement issued by the 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.
On April 16, the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MCA) issued an office memorandum directing 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.
