Soon, air travellers have to pay higher security fee to cover security deployment at airports. Security fees for domestic passengers may go up by Rs 20 to Rs 150, while for international passengers, the same may go up by Rs 40 to Rs 170. Currently, both domestic and international passengers pay Rs 130 as security fee.
Airports managed by Airport Authority of India (AAI) and Public Private Partnerships (PPP) owe a huge amount of money to Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), which provides security services at 61 airports. All airport operators have maintained PSF of Rs 130, which was decided years ago. Now, this fee is inadequate to meet CISF deployment expense.
“The government then set up a panel to review this demand. The panel is looking at a hike of Rs 20 for domestic passengers,” MA Ganapathy, CISF’s additional DG and incharge of airport sector said.
“Airport operators are gradually paying. A decision (on passenger security fee hike) is in fairly advanced stage,” CISF DG Rajesh Ranjan told ToI. Last July, airports owed CISF about Rs 1,000 crore with nearly 80% of the dues being from Delhi Airport alone. CISF estimates that growing air travel and opening of new airports and terminals will mean nearly 20,030 personnel will be required to provide security service at the airports.
