While Air India is offering discounts as much as 20 per cent on trunk routes, private players have knocked the government’s doors crying foul over the aggressive pricing, which is cutting into their yields and have urged for intervention as per a report in Indian Express by Smita Aggarwal. 

In a meeting with the civil aviation minister Vayalar Ravi, the domestic airlines’ body Federation of Indian Airlines (FIA), raised serious concerns over Air India’s pricing, which it said was suicidal and may even lead to worsening of some airlines’ financial condition. 

“They (FIA) demanded that government ask Air India to increase its fares,” said a ministry official, present at the meeting held last week. 

FIA also cited a rule contained in the Aircraft Act which prohibited airlines from selling tickets at below cost. Besides Jet Airways’ Naresh Goyal, CEOs of all airlines — IndiGo’s Aditya Ghosh, Kingfisher Airlines’ Sanjay Aggarwal and Spice Jet’s Neil Mills — attended the meeting.