India is known to have a good air travel culture. The country has more than 130 airports. 90 of these are run by the government.

While most of the services in airport are good, there is one problem that stands out quite clearly, the prices of food and drinks. One can say, they are largely unregulated. Most often, fliers don’t buy anything because they are so expensive.

Even buying a bottle of water can be quite expensive for the average flier.

After receiving many complaints from fliers, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) has finally decided to take action.

They issued a circular to all government-run airports and said that water and other snacks will have to be sold only at the Maximum Retail Price (MRP).

According to a senior AAI official, the company that runs food courts at airports were told to maintain a separate counter where water bottles and sandwiches are sold at MRP.

The stalls are also told to sell tea and coffee at ₹10. Some other cheap snacks like samosa are also asked to be made cheaper.

The stalls might sell some other items at different rates but they have to keep some basic items at reasonable prices.

In order to setup these separate food counters, bids have already been invited by the AAI.

In the current state, many sellers are increasing the prices of many products even past their MRP. The Union Ministry of Consumer Affairs issued an order last year saying that this practice should be stopped with effect from January 1, 2018. Everything should be sold at the same MRP just like anywhere else.

While this rule is good, most of the times, the airports stores stock up on products and brands which are only available at airports. So they have an expensive MRP there for those products.

Hopefully by setting up new kinds of counters at airports, at least some basic products can be made cheaper and affordable to the fliers.

Image Reference: Thebetterindia