The Ministry of Civil Aviation said on Monday that three passengers were placed on the ‘No Fly List’ this year, while a total of 63 passengers were placed on the list in 2022.
A total of 143 passengers have been listed since 2017, according to data provided by the ministry to the Rajya Sabha.
These passengers were placed on the list as recommended by internal airline committees established under aviation regulator DGCA’s Civil Aviation Requirements (CAR) related to handling unruly/disruptive passengers.
The CAR was notified in September 2017 as a measure to address the problem related to the handling of unruly/disruptive passengers.
“To date, there are 143 passengers who have been placed on the ‘No Fly List’ during the said period, based on the recommendations of the airline’s internal committee… since 2017,” said Minister of State for Civil Aviation VK Singh, to the Rajya Sabha. in a written response.
According to the data, Air India has put three passengers on the list in 2023.
In 2022, IndiGo placed 46 people on the No-Fly List, while Vistara had placed 16 passengers on the list. SpiceJet had put 1 passenger on the list, the data showed.
According to the data, in 2021, IndiGo listed a total of 45 people, 19 Vistara and 2 AirAsia.
IndiGo had put 10 people on the list in 2020 and the now-defunct Jet Airways had placed one passenger on the no-fly list in 2017.
In another written response, the minister said a total of 63 passengers were listed last year.
“These include two urination incidents that have come to the attention of the General Directorate of Civil Aeronautics (DGCA) in the last year.
Most of the passengers placed on the ‘No Fly List’ were for the violation related to not wearing masks or not obeying instructions from crew members,” he said.
The CAR related to the handling of unruly passengers is applicable to all Indian operators involved in scheduled and non-scheduled air transport services, both domestic and international, for the carriage of passengers.
It also applies to all airport operators within Indian territory, to all passengers during the period of air travel in or over India and to all foreign carriers subject to compliance with the Tokyo Convention 1963.
CAR provides measures to prevent such incidents by training flight crew, cabin crew and ground staff in soft skills for dealing with unruly passengers, as well as how to detect, defuse and prevent a critical situation.
“It also provides for the training of said operational personnel to deal with conflicts and their consequences, ways/means to mitigate situations that arise due to long waiting lines, flight overbooking, delays and diversions/cancellations, as well as lack of of information, etc.” singh said.