Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) will take measures that passengers don’t face inconvenience or hardship because of Shaheen Air International’s (SAI’s) irresponsible behaviour of selling tickets of un-sanctioned new routes despite the Sindh High Court’s (SHC) refusal to grant the permission.
The CAA strongly sets aside SAI’s allegations about the recent woes, distress and agony of passengers being caused by the regulator and has termed such allegations from SAI as a cover up of airline’s incompetence and inability to work according to the Standard Operating Procedures (SOP).
In its statement, the SAI has been naive to term flying on new routes as routine timetable changes and trying to mislead general public covering up for its extreme mismanagement and violation of rules and regulations.
Starting up a new and unauthorised international route cannot be construed as a routine timetable change. Sale of tickets for unauthorised routes is not only a violation but also misleads passengers into buying tickets. It becomes a scam for innocent potential passengers who are unaware of the ground realities.
The airline has time and again tried to twist the facts and even the judgements of the SHC to shift the blame for its mismanagement, inefficiency and lawlessness on CAA. Boarding bridge facility was withdrawn from SAI because it failed to clear its outstanding dues since months despite numerous commitments from its top management.
Furthermore, the SHC has not ordered CAA to resume the boarding bridge facility to SAI. In fact, it was resumed only after payment of CAA’s outstanding dues were made binding on SAI through the court order.
Moreover, SHC has not ruled in favour of SAI on its Regular Public Transport (RPT) License issue. The issue is sub judice in the court where the SHC through its legal process is considering the case in which CAA has a clear stance that SAI has failed to meet the formalities of the renewal of its license, which it must do within 45 days in the best interest of safety and rights of the travelling public in Pakistan.
