Kingfisher Cancels 13 Flights from Bangalore

Bangalore, Feb 19 (PTI): Passengers of Kingfisher Airlines from the city were put to hardship as the cash-strapped airlines on Sunday cancelled at least 13 flights from Bangalore International Airport (BIA) for about four days.

"At least 13 flights departing from BIA to various cities have been cancelled," airport sources said.

Flights to Mumbai, Chennai, Goa, Mangalore, Hubli, Vijayawada and Coimbatore had been cancelled, they said.

Kingfisher Airlines had yesterday said it was a planned move to curtail operations over the next four days.

“Admittedly there have been flight disruptions since yesterday which will continue for four days due to unexpected events including bird strikes which rendered aircraft out of service,” a Kingfisher Airlines spokesperson said.

Airport sources also said the stranded passengers at BIA were accommodated in other airlines flights and some others were informed about cancellations beforehand.

Most of the agitated passengers who gathered at the Kingfisher Airlines' counter at the airport complained that they were not informed earlier about the cancellations expressed unhappiness over the wait for long hours at the airport.

Kingfisher Airlines service was disrupted for the second day today as it cancelled a large number of flights with the Income Tax department freezing some of its accounts.

As many as 16 flights from Mumbai and four from Delhi, including one to Kathmandu were cancelled. Operations from Kolkata, from where it operates at least seven flights each day, are halted since Friday night.

Alarmed over reports of large-scale flight disruptions, Directorate General of Civil Aviation has started gathering information on the cancellations and delays and would decide whether to initiate any action on the airline on that basis.

"We have received reports about large-scale cancellations. They are bound to inform us when they cut their schedule. But they have not done so," DGCA chief E K Bharat Bhushan told PTI.

He said if the reports were true, such large of flight disruption would constitute violation of rules.

"We are gathering information from all the centres. Once we get this, we will decide what to do," he said.

Under Rule 140(A) of the Aircraft Rules, 1937 operators require to have prior approval of DGCA to curtail their flight schedules.

The airline has admitted curtailment in its flight schedule saying such a situation would continue for the next four days.

"We will operate the full schedule on our booking system within the next four days," Kingfisher spokesman said late last night.

The airline was operating only about 160-180 flights out of its already curtailed winter schedule of 240. The sources said operations from Tier-II and Tier-III cities are likely to be affected until March-end.

It had also said that the I-T department had frozen its account due to non-clearance of tax dues.

"We confirm that our Bank accounts were attached by the tax authorities. However, this has happened in the past not just to us but also to Air India. We have resolved issues before and will do so again," the Kingfisher spokesman said.

The airline began cancelling its flights as it held talks with bankers to finalise a deal for funds. Kingfisher posted a Rs 444 crore loss for the third quarter.

The airline has suffered a loss of Rs 1,027 crore in 2010-11 and has a debt of Rs 7,057.08 crore, latest figures show.

Bhushan also said that messages have been sent by the DGCA to all other airlines to accommodate all passengers stranded due to these cancellations by Kingfisher.

"They have to do this without enhancing the fares," he said when asked about the severe hardships being faced by the passengers of cancelled Kingfisher flights.