Last week the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) once again deferred full implementation of the ground handling policy at airports, backing off in the face of stiff opposition from various quarters, particularly airlines including international carriers. This paints an embarrassing situation for the apex decision-making authority of the country because it had approved the policy 27 months ago in February 2007 but has had to constantly relent despite serious security questions on the table. Now, we hear that the CCS has given six months to the Civil Aviation Ministry to carry out a review of all questions and come up with a “comprehensive proposal” before December 31.

It is both a political and bureaucratic failure that a consensus has not been achieved among all stakeholders, resulting in delaying a policy that the government believes has vital security ramifications. Matters got further complicated in the first week of June when the US State Department wrote a terse letter to the Civil Aviation Ministry opposing the policy which disallows foreign carriers from carrying out their own ground handling. Even though not all US airlines have their own ground handling staff here, the US government said the airlines would not want the option foreclosed and termed the move as violating the Indo-US Open Skies agreement. “If new rules are implemented that preclude self-handling by US carriers, it is our expectation that the matter would be raised formally under the agreement,” wrote the State Department on June 4, even threatening “countermeasures.”

The need for such a policy started with the proliferation of airlines during the short aviation boom in the early part of this decade. Indian aviation has been a target of terror, be it the Kanishka bombing or the Kandahar hijack. 9/11 and the bombing of the Colombo airport kept underlining the point to not take aviation security lightly.

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