Supreme Court directs Centre, airlines to discuss refund money for cancelled tickets

The Supreme Court on Friday took up for hearing the petition filed seeking a refund of the money spent on booking airline tickets that had been cancelled during the lockdown period. The apex court asked the Centre to take a stand on the issue, even as the Solicitor General Tushar Mehta told the Supreme Court that “in his personal view, the money ought to be returned to the people”.

Senior Advocate and former Solicitor General Harish Salve representing a private airline stated that none of the airlines had made any money during the lockdown period and instead, had suffered a hit of over 60 billion dollars globally.

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'There is zero revenue to the airlines'

“There is zero revenue to the airlines,” Senior Advocate Harish Salve said. He went on to say that “nowhere in the world were airlines refunding the complete fare to the passengers for the cancelled flights”.

The airlines said that they would like to sit down with the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Government of India and arrive at a solution in the best interest of the people, while also ensuring no prejudice is caused to the airlines.

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The Supreme Court asked the Centre and the airlines to sit together and reach a decision after discussing the modalities on how the refund can be processed, if at all. The top court also suggested that the airlines can credit the money back to the accounts of the users and allow the passengers to use the credited money to book a flight for any other route.

The Government and the airlines have been asked to formulate a plan and come back to the Supreme Court after 3 weeks. In this regard, a notice was issued to the Centre to respond to the petitions clarifying their stand.

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