Plea filed in Delhi HC to ensure full refund of airfare to Jet Airways passengers

An application has been filed in the Delhi High Court seeking a direction to the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Directorate General of Civil Aviation to ensure that passengers affected by the suspension of Jet Airways services either receive a full refund of the airfare paid by them or get accommodated in alternative flights in other airlines..Filed through Advocates Shashank Deo Sudhi, Dinesh Kumar Dakoria and Bijender P Kumar, the application also seeks ‘reasonable compensation’ for such passengers..The application forms part of a pending 2018 writ petition which seeks capping of airfare in public interest..With the grounding of debt-ridden Jet Airways, more than Rs 360 crore of passengers’ hard earned money is under threat due to non-refund of the ticket value, the applicant, Bejon Kumar Misra has contended..These ‘vulnerable’ passengers are now purchasing alternative tickets at highly exorbitant costs due to profiteering by other competitor airlines, it is further submitted..It is the applicant’s grievance that in spite of the growing anxiety and mental agony, neither MCA nor DGCA has announced any relief or emergency steps till date..The application further reads,.“Suddenly without prior information or notice, more than 100 flights being cancelled and passengers are constrained to run from pillar to post for managing their urgent official and personal commitments, resulting in huge damages and chaos to seek alternative mode of travel and seats on other airlines, who are profiteering out of an avoidable crisis if respondent No.2 & 3 would have conducted themselves in a more responsible and judicious manner…The airlines are behaving in complete violation of our constitutional rights and encouraging monopolistic practices to prevail in connivance with the respondents....there is a complete chaotic aviation crisis looming over the country where the consumers/passengers are victims on account of absence of any robust and effective regulator in the aviation sector in India to regulate the functioning of the airlines in a fair and ethical manner in order to monitor and regulate airfares in the interest of the passengers at large.”.The application also calls for amendments to the existing laws to make airlines liable for all the damages caused to the passengers and the reputation of our country..The matter is likely to come up for hearing on April 24.