Jet Airways to take off again; Mumbai travel agents ask about compensation

It is ready jet set go for Jet Airways which has formally announced the resumption of its domestic operations in the first quarter of 2022 according to Jalan Kalrock Consortium which is the resolution applicant of the airline Meanwhile travel agents who lost copious amounts of money following the carrierrsquos grounding two years ago ask about the compensation for the losses they incurredA press release from the company said the process of reviving the grounded carrier is at the takeoff stage It stated that work is on for slot allocation required airport infrastructure and night parkingMurari Lal Jalan lead of the Consortium said they received National Company Law Tribunal NCLT approval in June 2021 and Jet Airways 20 is looking at a domestic restart next year and shorthaul international operations in the third and fourth quarters of 2022The company will be headquartered in DelhiNCR and has already announced ambitious fleet numbers saying it hopes to have 50plus aircraft in three years and approximately 100 in five years It has also announced plans to add 1000plus employees to its existing strength of 150 staffers across categoriesMoney owedMumbairsquos Ajay Prakash head of Travel Agents Federation of India TAFI said ldquoJet Airways owes travel agents crores of rupees the money that has not been refunded since the airline was grounded People who support this comeback must also think about the huge amount owed to different agents and by that measure this is money of the travelling public The traveller had booked tickets through the agent The agent books tickets with the airline The airline gets grounded So travellers are unable to fly They ask for refunds but the airline has not repaid the travel agent as the ticket got cancelled since the flights did not operate How then are agents supposed to pay the traveller back If they do it is at a huge loss When agents asked for refunds when the airline was grounded and there were very few people to ask we got empty placatory answers like lsquoyes we are working on itrsquordquoPrakash asked ldquoIf I as an agent defaulted in my payment to the airline the International Air Transport Association IATA would not give me permission to restart till I paid all my outstanding dues By that yardstick why should the airline as an entity have a different set of rulesrdquoThe company said the process of reviving the grounded carrier is at the takeoff stage File picAFPHe added ldquoWe are in the same business so one needs a level playing field The NCLT order in the case of Jet Airways mandated that all claimants would get Rs 15000 as outstanding mdash regardless of the amount owed That is nowhere near what passengers and agents are owedrdquoPrakash claimed TAFI has asked that it is imperative that the government along with the Directorate General of Civil Aviation DGCA put in place a system where the monies of the travelling public are protected ldquoThey can come back but they should also pay these amounts otherwise it is absolutely criminalrdquo finished the TAFI presidentParvez Damania founder of erstwhile Damania Airways and Ajay Prakash president Travel Agents Federation of IndiaFresh slateParvez Damania of the Damania Airways fame and later the former executive director of Kingfisher Airlines said ldquoI am unsure about the future of Jet Airways It used to be a strong brand and was a great product Yet today I do not know about the aircraft they have or the slots available to them The slots have been allocated to other airlines and the positive equity seems to have gone too Their senior staff mdash pilots mdash seem to have been absorbed by other airlinesldquoIn such a scenario a new airline starting on a fresh slate is better than carrying on the legacy of the old airline with all its liabilities and legal casesrdquo finished the Mumbai entrepreneur who blazed a trail with his nowdefunct Damania Airways