Naidu reviews airlines' performance; asks them to ensure reasonable fares in festive season
New Delhi (PTI): Civil Aviation Minister K Rammohan Naidu on Friday held a review meeting with officials of airlines to assess their operational and technical performance, and asked them to keep airfares at reasonable levels during the festive season.
Representatives of Air India, Air India Express, IndiGo, Akasa Air, Alliance Air, Fly91, FlyBig and IndiaOne Air, among others, participated in the meeting. They presented their performance metrics, including action taken reports on security incidents and passenger grievances, according to an official release.
During the meeting with the airline representatives that went on for more than five hours, Naidu emphasised that they should strictly adhere to safety protocols.
The periodic meeting also came against the backdrop of two incidents involving Air India's Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft.
Naidu asked airlines to adopt best practices in passenger convenience and service quality.
"Detailed discussions were held with each airline on identifying bottlenecks in their operations and addressing their challenges," an official release said on Friday.
Amid concerns about airfares surging during festive seasons when there is more traffic demand, the minister told the airlines to ensure that airfares remain reasonable across the sectors during the upcoming festival season.
"Airlines assured that passenger convenience will remain their top priority and informed that additional flight capacities have been deployed on high-traffic routes to meet festive demand," the release said.
The civil aviation ministry's passenger grievance redressal portal, AirSewa, has been upgraded for enabling passengers to register complaints related to high airfares.
The minister has also directed aviation regulator DGCA that its Tariff Monitoring Unit should keep a strict vigil to ensure compliance with the tariff range declared by airlines.
At the meeting, grievance redressal was discussed, with airlines asked to qualitatively close passenger grievances in a timely manner.
Civil Aviation Secretary Samir Kumar Sinha, DGCA DG Faiz Ahmed Kidwai and other senior ministry officials also participated in the meeting.
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Trump says Pak PM told him millions would have died without his intervention
New York/Washington (PTI): US President Donald Trump has said that Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif told him that 35 million people would have died if it were not for his intervention in stopping the war between India and Pakistan.
In his over 100-minute-long State of the Union address on Tuesday, Trump repeated his claim that he had helped prevent what could have turned into a nuclear war between the two South Asian neighbours.
“In my first 10 months, I ended eight wars... including Pakistan and India, which would have been a nuclear war. Thirty-five million people, said the Prime Minister of Pakistan, would have died if it were not for my involvement,” Trump said.
The US President has previously made similar claims, stating that Sharif had credited him with saving millions of lives by helping end the conflict between the nuclear-armed neighbours. On earlier occasions, Trump had cited lower figures, including 25 million and later 10 million lives.
Trump has repeatedly claimed credit for stopping the conflict between India and Pakistan, an assertion he has now made about 100 times since May 10 last year, when he announced on social media that India and Pakistan agreed to a “full and immediate” ceasefire after a “long night” of talks mediated by Washington.
India has consistently denied any third-party intervention.
In his address, Trump also listed several other conflicts that he claimed to have helped resolve, including Cambodia and Thailand, Kosovo and Serbia, Israel and Iran, Egypt and Ethiopia, Armenia and Azerbaijan, the Congo and Rwanda, and the war in Gaza, which he said was now proceeding “at a very low level”.
Trump said the US is restoring security at home and abroad.
“We're proudly restoring safety for Americans at home and we are also restoring security for Americans abroad. Our country has never been stronger,” the president said in his second State of the Union address of his second term in the White House.
At one point, some Democratic lawmakers interrupted Trump's speech, prompting him to respond, “Isn't it funny? Sick people.”
STORY | Trump says Pak PM told him millions would have died without his intervention
— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) February 25, 2026
US President Donald Trump has said that Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif told him that 35 million people would have died if it were not for his intervention in stopping the war between… https://t.co/NnkX8w3Lrg
