The CPI(M) on Tuesday demanded immediate withdrawal of the government's decision to allow the GMR-led consortium, developing the Delhi airport, to charge development fee from passengers to fund modernisation work.
"The passengers cannot be asked to pay for the failure of the private company," the party Politburo said in a statement, describing as "untenable" the plea of Delhi International Airport Ltd (DIAL) that it was unable to raise money from the lenders and the market.
It said when the Left parties had opposed privatisation of Delhi and Mumbai airports, the UPA government had justified the move 'in the name of resource crunch of Airports Authority of India vis-a-vis capability of GMR and other private agencies to mobilise resources.'
Condemning the decision to allow DIAL to charge Rs 200 and Rs 1,300 from domestic and international passengers, respectively, the party said the government 'cannot bail out GMR with public money in violation of the Operation, Management and Development Agreement (OMDA) entered between AAI and DIAL, which specifically binds DIAL to complete the job for the forthcoming Commonwealth Games by 2010.'
The CPI(M) said, "As a matter of fact, the civil aviation ministry had informed even in August 2008 that the progress of job is satisfactory and delay if any was only because of delay in obtaining approvals by DIAL."