CPI national secretary D Raja on Tuesday urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to intervene and check hidden attempts to privatise Air India and lease out the Chennai and Kolkata airports to private parties.
In his letter to the Prime Minister, the CPI leader pointed out that though Government earmarked `8,475 crores to Air India, only `5,000 crore was released.
“There is a need for Government to safeguard the smooth running of Air India , the national air carrier. The Government had released only `5,000 crores instead of the earmarked `8,745 crores to Air India in the last fiscal. The remaining amount has not yet been released. The Government has promised to bring a Civil Aviation Policy but did not do it even after so many years. It is undertaking privatization in bits and pieces without taking Parliament into confidence. While equity was not being infused in Air India in accordance with the turnaround plan, the Airports Authority of India is also being systematically undermined,” said Raja.
Raja pointed out that it was highly deplorable to hand over Chennai and Kolkata airports to private parties, after spending more than `4,000 crore from public exchequer for modernination of these airports.
“It does not make sense to hand over these airports to private operators. We have seen that the private operators of other airports like Delhi , Mumbai, etc have created economic turbulence in the civil aviation sector. Private airports have been charging huge fees for landing, all other services and have collected thousands of crores of User Development Fees,” he said.
“The experience of private airport operators in Delhi and Mumbai has shown that they use government investments as leverage and drain away funds and try to utilize the real estate for a commercial quick buck. The public is the last in their consideration,” added Raja.