This refers to the article, “It's a flight of fancy, literally” (October 25) by Kushan Mitra. The new regional aviation scheme, Udan (Ude Desh Ka Aam Naagrik) introduced by the Government, is a typical socialistic network of bureaucratic controls that manifests inefficient policy making and shoddy implementation. Instead of encouraging competition and allowing free play of market forces, the Government has taken upon itself the prerogative of creating artificial monopolies in the pretext of providing viability gap funding.
The open-ended subsidy model that has been proposed by the Government, to make air travel affordable for the aam aadmi, is not only vulnerable to legal challenges, but will also attract capital-deficient entrepreneurs in a volatile sector that has high exit barriers. It is time the Government came up with a more robust execution plan to ensure undistorted competition in the skies.