Aviation ministry’s praise for SpiceJet that never had any official sanction

New Delhi: On 2 September, struggling low-cost carrier SpiceJet issued a press release saying the civil aviation ministry had commended it for ‘outstanding customer service’.

It was a curious announcement that caught the ministry’s top officials unawares, since there was no such commendation given and the airline had even been put on ‘enhanced surveillance’ by aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) just four days earlier.

An inquiry by the ministry revealed that the commendation was fake, according to two senior officials aware of the development. The press release was based on an email from an operator at Air Sewa’s control room who had acted on his own, without proper authorisation, the officials said, adding that the operator has since been relieved of his job.

“We were shocked to see such a press release doing the rounds, that too just four days after the DGCA had put them on enhanced surveillance,” said one of the two officials, who did not want to be identified. “We inquired into it and found out that the guy acted on his own.”

The person who sent out the email was an employee of a private company that has been contracted to manage the Air Sewa control centre. “We asked the company to immediately fire that employee and it has been done now,” the official added.

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A second official expressed shock at the incident. “We read the content of the email and there is no way the operator would have drafted such an email,” the second official said, also requesting anonymity.

“The airline may have an interest, but what was it that motivated the employee to send an email needs to be looked into,” the official said, adding that some changes need to be put in place to ensure a repeat of this incident does not happen.

Queries emailed to SpiceJet and the aviation ministry did not elicit any response till print time.

What is Air Sewa?

Air Sewa was launched in 2016 by the aviation ministry as a grievance redressal mechanism for passengers, to receive customer complaints of all kinds—even a dirty toilet at an airport. On receiving a complaint, the control room in the ministry’s building attempts to resolve it by coordinating with the concerned airport operator. There is a mechanism of feedback also to assess the outcome.

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Air Sewa also collates data on number of complaints filed against airlines or airports and shares it with the government.

SpiceJet’s troubles

SpiceJet, which is struggling financially since the covid-19 pandemic, is struggling operationally, too, with under 40 aircraft of a 70-plus fleet grounded due to shortage of spares or litigations.

In September-end, the airline received a funding of ₹3,000 crore. That has helped it clear salary due to employees as well as make payments to several vendors. The airline has also said that the funding will help it bring about 100 aircraft back to flying. The current operational fleet is under 30 aircraft.

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For context, this ‘commendation’ from the aviation ministry would have helped the airline bring some positive news around it since the DGCA had put the airline under ‘enhanced surveillance’ just four days earlier.

“In light of the past record and the special audit carried out in August 2024, SpiceJet has once again been placed under enhanced surveillance with immediate effect. This would entail an increase in the number of spot checks/night surveillance with a view to ensure the safety of operations,” the DGCA had said in a statement issued on 29 August.