Tag Archives: Ashwani Lohani

The government has appointed senior IAS officer Rajiv Bansal as the Chairman and Managing Director of Air India for three months. Bansal, who is additional secretary and financial adviser at the petroleum ministry, will replace Ashwani Lohani-who has been appointed as the Chairman of Railway Board. A senior civil aviation ministry official reportedly said that Bansal has been appointed as Air India CMD for three months. Bansal is from the Nagaland cadre of 1988 batch and hails from Haryana. He is taking over as Air India CMD at a time when the government is working on the modalities for the disinvestment of the loss-making national carrier. He had served at the civil aviation ministry between 2006 and 2008. (Source: PTI)

Ashwani Lohani has been named the Chairman of the Railway Board after A.K. Mittal resigned from the position. Lohani continues to be the Chairman and Managing Director of Air India until further notice. An officer of Indian Railway Service of Mechanical Engineering (IRSME) cadre, Lohani has held the position of DRM, Delhi Division, as well as National Rail Museum; and Chief Administrative Officer, Rail Alternate Fuel. Mittal reportedly resigned owing moral responsibility of the Puri-Haridwar Utkal Express derailment in Uttar Pradesh. Lohani has to his credit a Guinness World Record of running the world’s oldest working steam locomotive—‘Fairy Queen Express’. Before Air India, he was at the helm of Madhya Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation and India Tourism Development Corporation. With four engineering degrees, Lohani has even authored two books.

Air India has a market share of 17 per cent in the North East, which seemingly is a profitable sector for the airline. Ashwani Lohani, Chairman & Managing Director, Air India informed that while some sectors are not profitable in the North East, overall the operations remain gainful as they get a viability gap funding from North Eastern Council (NEC). He also informed that they are considering to operate a direct flight between Guwahati and Bangkok or between Guwahati and Kunming thrice a week. He informed that they are planning to start a new flight between New Delhi and Guwahati from June 28, taking the number of flights on this route to two. Also the Guwahati-Kolkata flight is most definitely on the cards.

Air India is all set to start new flights not only under government’s Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik (UDAN) scheme, but non-UDAN flights as well to strengthen its domestic network. Ashwani Lohani, CMD, Air India, informs, “We will be starting flights under UDAN to Pathankot and Ludhiana. There will be non UDAN flights as well, and we will be starting new flights from Lucknow from June 25 on Lucknow-Jaipur, Lucknow-Dehradun and Lucknow-Bhopal routes. In South India, we will be putting an airplane in Bengaluru this month, which would be flying to Coimbatore, Chennai and Madurai.”

Flag carrier Air India has announced direct flights between New Delhi and Copenhagen thereby adding its 11th destination in Europe. Starting from September 16, these flights will operate thrice a week. “We aim to serve 37,500 passengers each way for the entire year. If we touch that figure then we will make it a daily service,” Ashwani Lohani, Chairman and Managing Director, Air India, reportedly said at an event. This is the third international flight launched by the national carrier this year, besides services to Washington from July 7 and to Stockholm from August 16, Lohani added. In his Facebook post last month, the CMD had also announced plans to connect Los Angeles from September 1 as well as Tel Aviv, Nairobi and Dallas this year. In 2016, traffic between the two countries grew by 10.1 per cent, according to a statement issued by the Embassy of Denmark. The number of visas to Denmark issued in India increased by 20 per cent compared to the year before, the statement added. Copenhagen airport is the third busiest airport in northern Europe and averaged 726 daily departures and arrivals in 2016 and served a total of 29 million passengers. (Source: PTI)

Air India will commence non-stop flight service between Delhi and Stockholm from August 15, 2017. The flight will operate thrice a week (Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays) with each flight roughly having eight-hour duration. Ashwani Lohani, Chairman & Managing Director, Air India, said, “As part of Air India’s international route network expansion plans, we are happy to announce the Delhi-Stockholm direct flight from August 15, 2017. The flight will be operated thrice a week on Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft.” The flight will depart from Delhi at 1400 hrs (IST) and land at Stockholm at 1820 hrs (CET). The return flight will leave Stockholm at 2100 hrs (CET) and reach Delhi the next morning. “This comes at a very positive time in our relations and will continue to strengthen our partnership for the future. We appreciate the importance it will have for our bilateral relations, especially for people-to-people relations, for tourism in both directions, for students and for business and investment,” said Ann Linde, Minister for EU Affairs and Trade, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Govt. of Sweden, who is currently on a two-day visit to India. Incoming traffic from India to Sweden has grown over the years. In 2016, Sweden had 175,088 bed nights (commercial overnight stays) from India as per the statistics fromTillväxtverket (the Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth) which was 128% up from the bed nights registered in 2011. “For us, India is a market with great potential for Swedish Tourism. During the last five years more and more Indians chose Sweden as their holiday destination. Beautiful nature, unique experiences such as the Northern lights, and its progressive lifestyle makes Sweden an exciting emerging destination for Indian travellers. …

After recent incidents of unruly behaviour with its employees on board, Air India might put in place new rules, which might have steep fines up to Rs. 15 lakhs. The airline, reportedly is planning to impose a fine of Rs 5 lakh for delaying a flight up to an hour; Rs 10 lakh for delay of 1-2 hours and as much as Rs 15 lakh for delay over two hours. According to official, a plan to curb such behaviour has been drafted and awaiting approval from Ashwani Lohani, CMD, Air India.

Air India (AI) has announced that the Indian national carrier will commence flights between India and Israel by May this year. The airline is planning to open the New Delhi-Tel Aviv route with three weekly flights. Commenting on the commencement of the new flight, Ashwani Lohani, Chairman and Managing Director, Air India, reportedly said, “Air India is looking forward to the opening of the direct route to Israel in a few months’ time. I believe that this will have a positive effect on the tourism traffic between our two countries.” Yariv Levin, Minister of Tourism-Israel, reportedly said, “Air India Chairman Lohani was deeply impressed with his visit to Israel and, in his own words, is convinced that the many Indian tourists who will visit Israel will find it an exceptional tourism destination. There is no doubt that the opening of the route, combined with our marketing efforts in India, will generate a significant increase in incoming tourism from India.”

Air India has launched a new flight from Delhi to Kochi to Dubai, which would be starting from February 1, 2017, revealed Ashwani Lohani, CMD, Air India. Talking at an informal meeting, he said, “The Delhi-Kochi sector is an important an busy sector and hence the new flight has been started. This would further offer connection to Dubai, allowing people from Kochi to go to Dubai, which too is a popular route.” Other than that he revealed that in the international sector Air India will be starting a total of 6 routes and around 22 flights in the regional sector, which would eventually come under the government’s Regional Connectivity Scheme.

Air India’s outstation and domestic hubs are set to receive faster, cutting-edge connectivity through SITA. The global airport transport IT provider will provide faster, more reliable connectivity to the airline as part of a package of solutions aimed at transforming its communications and network infrastructure. Ashwani Lohani, Chairman and MD, Air India, said, “Having been a long-standing technology partner in aviation, SITA is able to fulfill the vision of passenger experience by identifying appropriate innovations covering network and communications that can help the airline to become more efficient and cost effective. This will help us benefit from the opportunities in the fast-growing Indian aviation market while elevating our international competitiveness.” The seven-year deal will see SITA roll out the latest communication technology both in India and internationally. Through SITA Connect – the largest communication network in the air transport industry used in over 220 countries and territories – Air India will be able to link all 93 international outstations and its six biggest airports in India to the airline’s central hubs in New Delhi and Mumbai. In addition, the airline will be able to leverage AirportHub™,  SITA’s unique shared infrastructure which allows airlines to connect all their applications and IT systems at an airport quickly and easily. It removes the complexity of dealing with local telecom providers and adds flexibility and agility to route management. AirportHub™ has already been deployed at over 300 airports around the world. SITA will also provide access to services, applications and data on any device and in any location through its End-User Computing solution. As a single-source provider embracing both traditional desktop and the latest technologies, SITA will provide both hardware and support to more …