No preferential screening of business, executive class travellers at Delhi airport

Business or executive class air travellers will no longer enjoy the luxury of a separate counter for screening and will have to join the economy class passengers at Indira Gandhi International Airport here

New Delhi: Business or executive class air travellers will no longer enjoy the luxury of a separate counter for screening and will have to join the economy class passengers at Indira Gandhi International Airport here.

The civil aviation security regulator, Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS), has decided to do away with the practise of having separate queue for passengers of business or executive class for screening at IGI airport here, in a bid to cut down screening time and facilitate smooth travel for the air travellers.

The BCAS, in a communication, said that there will be no separate queue for business or executive (first) class passengers.

Earlier, there used to be a separate queue for screening of passengers travelling in business and executive class. Also, there would be a dedicated channel for airline crew, senior citizens, who are above 60 years of age, and for persons with disability.

The airline's crew, however, has been spared of these new rules and they would continue to be acceded an out-of-turn screening, it said, adding passengers in the queue whose flight departure is imminent would also be accorded out-of-turn screening at the airport.

"The new instructions are being rolled out in order to streamline the screening of passengers at the terminals (international and domestic) at Delhi airport and have to be complied with," BCAS said in a communication to stakeholders late last month.

With passenger traffic at Delhi airport set to touch 40 million mark by the end this fiscal, the measures, which include having one queue for all passengers irrespective of the class to the extent possible, are aimed at doing away with the chaos generally witnessed during peak traffic hours at the country's busiest airports.

The effectiveness of the measures would be reviewed after one month of implementation. The measures have already come into effect from February 26, it said.

The BCAS also said there will be no restrictions regarding maximum time taken, before estimated time of departure, for screening of passengers.

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