The committee has suggested that a system of reverse auctioning should be implemented for the distribution of these routes among the three domestic airlines.
The committee, which has submitted its interim report to the ministry, has suggested that bids should be invited for various Category II routes and the flight rights should be awarded to the lowest bidder. The fund would meet the operating costs of the airlines.
The fund, according to official sources, would be on the lines of the universal service obligation fund for rural telephony in the telecom sector. It has been suggested that the fund should be set up through a levy of a cess on air fare.
The idea of reverse auctioning of unprofitable routes was something that had been considered by the civil aviation ministry earlier.
Official sources said that the Naresh Chandra committee came up with this recommendation after discussions with the industry and officials of the civil aviation ministry.
The government has categorised various sectors in the country into three categories. Category I comprises of trunk metro routes, while Category II consists of Jammu and Kashmir, North-east, Agatti and Andaman while Category III routes are non-metro sectors such as those originating from passenger destinations such as Jaipur, Udaipur, Ahmedabad.
The government has asked all airlines to mandatorily operate 10 per cent of their flights used on metro routes on category 2 routes, while for Category III routes the lower limit is 50 per cent.
According to Indian Airlines executives the carrier
