"When domestic and international passengers are using the same facility, how can airports justify differential costs for passengers," IATA corporate communications manager (Asia-Pacific) Albert Tjoeng told PTI.
Also, he stressed that such charges should be monitored and regulated by an airport economic regulator so that the airport operators do not charge in excess.
He also wanted India to hasten the process of establishing the regulatory body. The Airport Economic Regulator Authority Bill is pending before Parliament.
Tjoeng was responding to questions on the government's directive to the developers of new Hyderabad and Bangalore airports to charge user development fee (UDF) from international passengers only.
On the IATA decision to achieve 100 per cent e-ticketing by May this year as part of its paperless travel campaign, he said 91 per cent tickets were sold through this mode by all airlines operating in India in January, and exuded confidence that the country would meet the deadline.
"While India achieved 91 per cent of e-ticketing in January this year, the entire Asia-Pacific region achieved 88 per cent. On the whole, we plan to achieve 100 per cent e-ticketing by May," Tjoeng said, adding that IATA would "stop issuing paper tickets from June."
However, the IATA officer said there were some international airlines that intended never to convert to e-ticketing. "But the paper tickets issued by these airlines do not account for more than 0.1 per cent of total paper tickets worldwide," he said.
The IATA's Annual General Meeting in Vancouver last year had decided to extend the e-ticketing conversion deadline till May 21 this year, by when almost all major global airlines would have converted into the new system of ticket booking.
The paper ticketing system has been given a go-bye even in cases when a passenger needs to change to another airline to reach his final destination. This has been done through interline agreements between the airlines.
The IATA has approved almost 3,000 such interline agreements between global carriers to do away with paper ticketing.
Referring to another cost-cutting and environment- friendly initiative by the IATA, Tjoeng said the barcoded boarding pass system was increasingly being accepted by the airline industry.
In India, he said such a system was yet to pick up. The airlines needed to put in a one-time investment to launch barcoded boarding passes that could be printed on simple paper on the internet and not on glossy cards, which are required now.
