Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call to change the country’s ‘Look East’ policy to an ‘Act East’ has prompted the aviation ministry to ensure that the country’s North-Eastern region is better connected.
     In fact, the new civil aviation policy draft has specifically mentioned that a special package would be developed for the North-East.
     Meanwhile, entrepreneurs have charted out plans to connect the North-East of the country.
     The landlocked region has remained under-developed—one of the main reasons being lack of connectivity. While a number of domestic airlines have regular flights to the region’s main airports spanning across seven States – or ‘Seven Sisters’ as they are known – like Guwahati, Agartala, Imphal, Aizawl, and Dimapur, there are no dedicated cargo flights. Road and rail connections are doing the job but they are time-consuming. Freighter flights from Kolkata do, however, take place but they are few and far between.
     Stepping into the air cargo arena, Mumbai’s Sovika Group has charted out plans to launch a regular dedicated cargo airline service. Starting in the next couple of months with its base in Kolkata, the Sovika Aviation Services’ daily cargo service will see an ATR72 plying to the airports in the North-East. There were 17 airports in the 1970s but today there are only 11 functioning.
     Speaking about the services, Akhilesh Rao, Senior Vice President, Sovika Group, told this correspondent, “We had been toying with the idea for quite some time. Aviation is not new to us. We have been in this business, i.e Air Craft Leasing/Charters/Ground Handling/Terminal Management/Passenger GSA/Cargo GSA/ Business Aviation charters for more than two decades. We realized that the North-East was one of the under-developed regions and flying cargo flights would help the region’s economy hence we have decided to take this initiative forward,” Rao emphasized that the flights would be in tune with the government’s ‘Act East’ policy.
     Sovika’s management has done the required groundwork and have received 100 per cent support and assurance from the governments in Assam and Meghalaya. Along with the state governments of the region, the local trading community too, has welcomed the move and given assurance of their full support.
     Sovika hopes the freighter flights will be economically viable. “We hope to carry at least 10 tonnes of cargo to and from the Northeast every day. While cargo is carried by passenger aircraft, there are delays since there is lack of space in the aircraft,” said Rao.
     It is mandatory for domestic operators to operate commercial flights to the North-East – even though they might not be viable. Flights to the region have to adhere to the civil aviation ministry’s Route Dispersal Guidelines (RDG) which makes it obligatory for all Indian carriers to connect to destinations in the North East and other remote parts of the country. To lessen the financial burden for operating flights that are not economically viable but socially important, the government provides a subsidy.
     Almost two years ago, the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) had sent out a proposal to subsidize flights by private domestic carriers. The move came after a number of private airlines told the government that they would reduce the number of flights to the airports of the North-East because of operational losses. To encourage flights, for example, small aircraft like the ATRs do not have to pay airport charges in the North-East while ATF is available at only four per cent VAT instead of the 25-30 per cent for bigger aircraft.
     In fact, a couple of months ago, the North Eastern Council (NEC) signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Air India subsidiary Alliance Air to operate ATR flights in North-East till 2016. For this, the NEC has assured to get concessions for ATF, etc. Alliance Air had been operating 65 flights a week to the region till the end of 2012. After that, due to non-receipt of the government subsidy, the carrier had reduced capacity, operating only on the economically viable routes.
     A recent Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI)-PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) report, Gateway to the ASEAN-India's North East Frontier, has pointed out that while connectivity has improved in the region, intra-regional air connectivity was sparse.
Tirthankar Ghosh