Cabinet may take up civil aviation policy

The Union Cabinet is likely to take up for consideration and approval the national civil aviation policy in its meeting which is scheduled to take place on Wednesday (June 15), a move which may help in opening up foreign direct investment (FDI) in the aviation sector and facilitate viability gap funding for regional routes.

According to sources privy to the development, the Cabinet is also likely to give an official approval to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s May 26 announcement of hiking the retirement age of doctors to 65 years. Though Mr Modi, after making the announcement on May 26 in his Saharanpur rally (to mark the NDA government’s two years in office), had later tweeted on May 31 that the age of doctors in Central Health Service has been enhanced to 65 years with effect from the aforementioned date, the decision had not been officially approved by the Union Cabinet.

Now according to sources, the Union Cabinet is likely to approve the hike in retirement of doctors when it meets on June 15.

Meanwhile, once the national aviation policy is approved by the Cabinet, it may enable the government to hike FDI in the sector from the current 49 per cent to more than 50 per cent.

Also according to the draft national aviation policy, which was unveiled by the government in October 2015, the civil aviation ministry had kept all options open in international flying norms, technically known as “5/20 rule”. Currently under this rule, an airline requires five years of operations and 20 aircrafts in its fleet to become eligible for international routes.

However, the government has kept the draft policy quite open ended in the sense that it has offered three options. One is to continue with the said rule, second is to completely do away with the rule and thirdly, to replace the rule with a credit-based system.