DGCA holds emergency meet with Jet, asks airline to address passengers' woes

New Delhi: Amidst debt-ridden Jet Airways massively cancelling flights and grounding most of its fleet, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Tuesday held an emergency meeting with the cash-strapped airlines asking it to immediately address passengers' woes.

DGCA said that it has instructed Jet to comply with the relevant provisions of the applicable CARs for facilitation of passengers regarding timely communication, compensation, refunds and providing alternate flights wherever applicable.

The data will be constantly by DGCA on regular basis, it said.

The meeting comes after Aviation Minister Suresh Prabhu's direction to his ministry's secretary to hold an emergency meeting Jet Airways cancelling massive number of flights. He tweeted:

Directed Secretary, @MoCA_GoI to hold an emergency meeting on grounding of flights by Jet Airways, Advance bookings, Cancellation, Refunds and Safety issues, if any. Asked him to get a report on Jet compliance issues immediately from DGCA. @jayantsinha

— Chowkidar Suresh Prabhu (@sureshpprabhu) March 19, 2019

DGCA has also reviewed the performance of Jet on operational, airworthiness and passenger facilitation.

Current Jet's 41 fleets in operation, scheduled for 603 domestic flights and 382 international flights has been drawn. However, there may be further attrition in next coming weeks.

DGCA said that it is ensuring that all aircraft in the fleet whether in operation or on ground are maintained in accordance with Approved Maintenance Programme (AMP).

It has also directed Jet to ensure that no Pilots, cabin crew, AMEs be rostered on duty who had reported stress of any nature. Additionally, all such staff should be current with all mandatory training requirements.

DGCA further added that said that is continuously monitoring the overall situation and will take appropriate steps by the end of the month, depending on the turn of events.