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Kathmandu Thursday March 08, 2001 Falgun 25, 2057.
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Airport tax, fares to
increase soon
Post Report
KATHMANDU, March 7 - The domestic as well as
international air fares are likely to increase very soon as the government is looking into
the proposal submitted by Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) to hike all types of
aviation charges.
With an aim to make it self-reliant, the
Board of Directors (BoD) of CAAN has submitted a proposal to the cabinet to hike all kind
of the fees being charged at the airports.
The BoD, some weeks ago had sent the proposal
to Ministry of Finance, which along with necessary recommendation has now been sent to the
Council of Ministriers for the final approval.
CAAN, which was instituted as autonomous
institution some two years ago after dissolving Department of Civil Aviation, has still
not been able to become economically self reliant despite continued government investment
of over Rs 1 billion. A highly placed CAAN official said that the proposed increase in
airport fees is an attempt to make the authority self-reliant. He also hinted that the
proposed hike could be as high as 50 per cent.
If the proposal is approved by the cabinet,
then all the charges including both domestic and international passenger fees, parking,
landing and take off charges and charges of restaurants inside the airport would be hiked.
"The proposal to amend existing
regulations regarding the hike of various fees was forwarded after in-depth discussion
among the board members," said the source and added that the proposed increment of
fees would largely help to sort out the current financial problem of CAAN.
CAAN currently charges Rs 600 per passenger
leaving for SAARC region. And, it charges Rs 900 to Nepali national and Rs 1,000 to
foreigners leaving for any countries other than SAARC region. However, CAAN has been
charging different fees to domestic passenger depending upon location of airports. It
currently charges Rs 110 per passenger departing from the domestic terminal of Tribuhvan
International Airport, Kathmandu.
The country currently has forty-four airports,
including one international airport, four regional airports, seven middle sized airports
and thirty-two small airports.
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