State of aviation in India: 94 AAI airports suffered losses in 2017-18, says govt

New Delhi: As many as 94 aerodromes owned and managed by the Airports Authority of India (AAI) were in losses in the last financial year, according to the government. Civil Aviation Minister Suresh Prabhu said the AAI has taken steps to enhance revenue and reduce losses.

"AAI owns and manages 129 airports out of which 94 were running in loss in the financial year 2017-18. "The losses are mainly due to low revenue generation to meet the total expenditure of the respective airports," he said in a written reply to the Lok Sabha.

Meanwhile, Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha said that incidents of theft at airports have decreased.

There were 28 cases of theft "reported/ registered" across 17 airports in 2018 till June, as per data provided by him in a written reply. This compares to 59 and 64 such cases in 2017 and 2016, respectively.

In another written reply, Sinha said that no unique identification number for Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) has been issued by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) till date.

The Civil Aviation Ministry started registration process for drone operators in the country, to be done through a portal called 'Digital Sky', on December 1. "No unmanned aircraft operator permit has been issued to any entity till date," Sinha said.

Responding to another query pertaining to airlines levying additional charges from passengers, the minister said that airlines are charging for some of their preferential seats, the details of which are available on their respective websites.

"Airlines do not charge for their web check-in facility. "Additional charges are only applicable if the passenger opts to avail additional facilities like meals, preferential seats etc during web check-in process," he noted.