Airfares under watch: DGCA tariff monitoring unit created, Aviation Minister Naidu tells Parliament

Ram Mohan Naidu

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has set up a Tariff Monitoring Unit to track airfares and verify whether airlines are pricing tickets within their declared tariff sheets, Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu told Parliament, as the government faces pressure to rein in sharp fare spikes during disruptions.

Naidu said the government has capped fares during specific episodes of extraordinary demand or disruption, citing interventions after the Kashmir terror attack and during the surge of travel demand to Prayagraj, while arguing that permanent, sector-wide price controls are not feasible.

The minister’s comments come days after the government ordered airlines to adhere to prescribed fare caps following widespread cancellations by IndiGo that triggered sharp price spikes on key routes.

The ministry has framed the caps as a consumer-protection step during operational instability, while officials continue to monitor compliance.

According to disclosures cited in Parliament, the DGCA’s Tariff Monitoring Unit monitors airfares on 78 routes on a sample basis to ensure airlines do not charge outside the fare range declared by them.

That matters because India’s fare regime is not a free-for-all: airlines file tariff sheets and the regulator can check whether pricing stays within those bands, an enforcement lever the government is now publicly leaning on amid the IndiGo fallout.

Naidu told Parliament it is not possible to cap fares for an entire year on a specific sector because demand and supply play a role in fare discovery, but said the government will step in during exceptional situations.

Alongside monitoring and episodic caps, the minister has pitched a parallel model—Alliance Air’s ‘Fare Se Fursat,’ a pilot that offers a single fixed fare on select routes regardless of booking date, running October 13 to December 31, 2025.