Jay Bhatia, National Treasurer and Chairman (Tourism Council), Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI), has been appointed on UFTAA’s Global Tourism Committee to co-ordinate and enhance tourism initiatives among its members. National associations from over 80 countries are part of UFTAA. This was announced at UFTAA’s board meeting that was held in New Delhi on Thursday. On the appointment, Bhatia says, “Tourism from and in to India is increasing multi-fold India has now become the heart of the globe and all eyes are set on us. UFTAA and TAAI, both, endeavour to promote tourism through educating its members. At TAAI, we have already embarked on this path two years ago and have conducted various training programs for our members. This will be undertaken globally at UFTAA too.”

Garuda Indonesia, the national carrier of Indonesia, is reportedly planning to start flights between Mumbai and Bali, in order to tap the growing Indian honeymoon and Hindu pilgrimage markets. It is said that Garuda might operate charter flights in advance of plans for scheduled departures. According to Handayani, Commercial Director, Garuda Indonesia, the middle to upper classes of India are the ones who go on a religious journey to Bali. Currently, Garuda does not currently operate any flights to India, and no airline flies direct between Bali and India. Earlier this month Garuda commenced flights between Bali and Shanghai.

Air India has agreed to accept travel agents’ corporate credit card for booking, revealed Sunil Kumar, President, Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI). Speaking in New Delhi, at the UFTAA presentation for TAAI Northern Region members, he revealed that the team of TAAI had a meeting with Ashwani Lohani, CMD, Air India; Pankaj Srivastava, Director-Commercial, Air India, and other representative of the national carrier. “I am very impressed with the response from Ashwani Lohani, Pankaj Srivastava, and the entire team of Air India on allowing travel agents to use their corporate credit cards to do ticketing. We have been consistently talking to them on the airline having no objection if a customer uses his credit card, or the agent uses the customer’s credit card. However, the agent could not use his corporate credit card to make the booking. However, they listened to us, and we are highly obliged that may be within a week, the agent corporate credit card will be used by Air India as a form of payment.”

Air India Express will start flying from Kozhikode to Ras Al Khaimah four times a week from March 29 to October 24, 2016. The new flight has been added as part of the new summer schedule by the airline. On Wednesday and Saturday, it will fly directly from Kozhikode to Ras Al Khaimah and then go to Al Ain. However, on Monday and Friday, it will fly to Ras Al Khaimah via Al Ain. The timings are 10:40 am for all the four flights. The move comes as part of Air India Express’ plans to increase its frequency between Kerala and the Middle East to 119 flights per week from the present 96 a week in order to benefit Keralites working in Gulf countries. Acknowledging Kozhikode as its largest revenue centre, AIE increases its focus in this market by enhancing offered capacity to an all time high of 11,718 seats per week from the present 8,184 seats. The fare for the Kozhikode-Ras Al Khaimah flight is Rs. 11, 604.

The Cathay Pacific Group has announced that its’ wholly owned sister airline Dragonair is to be rebranded as Cathay Dragon. The two will remain as separate airlines, operating under their own licences. The rebranding will see a new livery created for Cathay Dragon that features a Cathay-style brushwing logo. This livery will appear for the first time on one of Cathay Dragon’s Airbus A330-300 aircraft in April and will be progressively introduced to the rest of the airline’s fleet. By more closely aligning the two brands, this rebranding will capitalise on Cathay Pacific’s high international brand recognition and leverage on Cathay Dragon’s unique connectivity into Mainland China – one of the world’s fastest-growing business and leisure travel markets. The Cathay Pacific Group will launch a major international advertising and marketing campaign later this year to promote recognition of Cathay Dragon and the benefits this rebranding will bring to passengers. Ivan Chu, Chief Executive, Cathay Pacific, said, “We are very proud of what we have achieved together. Cathay Dragon is a brand that will be recognisably part of the Cathay Pacific Group for our customers from different parts of the world. The rebranding will enable us to capture the fast-growing passenger flows across the two carriers by creating a more seamless travel experience. We are building on what is a true Hong Kong success story that has made our city a leading international aviation hub and gateway to and from Mainland China markets. This rebranding will sharpen our competitive edge by offering an attractive Cathay-led brand package that carries the assurance of a consistently high-quality customer experience,” Algernon Yau, Chief Executive Officer, Cathay Dragon, said, “We can assure our customers that Cathay Dragon will …

AirAsia X has announced the commencement of its new direct flight connecting New Delhi to Kuala Lumpur. The inaugural flight will land at the New Delhi international airport on February 3. “As part of our efforts to expand our flight network and to provide enhanced connectivity for our guests in the region, we are pleased to announce that we have started operating direct flights connecting New Delhi & Kuala Lumpur,” a statement from the airline said. The airline will be celebrating the inaugural flight on February 4 in New Delhi. Benyamin Ismail, Chief Executive Officer, AirAsia X Berhad will be making this special announcement at the celebration of the launch of this sector along with H.E. Datuk Naimun Ashakli Mohammad, High Commissioner of Malaysia to India, in the presence of Dr. Mahesh Sharma, Minister of state for Culture and Tourism (Independent Charge) and Civil Aviation and Dato Fam Lee Ee, Board of Director, AirAsia X. To celebrate the recommencement of New Delhi from Kuala Lumpur, AirAsia X offered an all-in-fares from as low as INR 7990 one way for the booking period Nov 23-29, 2015, with a travel period from February 3, 2016 until February 5, 2017.

In a bid to boost medical tourism into India, the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India, is planning to extend e-medical visa facility, said Vinod Zutshi, Secretary, Tourism, Government of India. Speaking on the recently held first meeting of National Medical and Wellness Tourism Promotion Board, he said, “India has a distinct advantage, in terms of cost of people in the medical industry, the time required for getting operation dates, and having state-of-the-art hospitals. Now, we are also contemplating to get the e-medical visa facility extended to various countries, so that the medical and wellness tourism in India prospers further.”

Thailand registered 1,069,149 Indian arrivals to the country between January-December 2015, registering a growth of 14.64 per cent over the same period in 2014, according to data released by the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, Govt. of Thailand. Speaking on the achievement, the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) Governor, Dr Yuthasak Supasorn, said “It was another remarkable year in 2015. The performance endorses the scope and effectiveness of the 2015 Discover Thainess campaign and its success in restoring travel confidence.” He adds that this year, they are targeting a growth of 10 per cent in Indian tourist arrivals and are working towards recording two million Indian arrivals by 2020. TAT recently appointed professional golfer Vani Kapoor as the Thai Golf Ambassador in a bid to promote golf tourism, among other niche segments, in India.  India is the sixth largest source market for Thailand, with China, Malaysia, Japan, Korea and Lao People’s Democratic Republic occupying the top five slots.

South Asian Travel and Tourism Exhibition (SATTE) 2017 will be held from February 15-17. The dates for the next year’s event were announced at the SATTE 2016, being held at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi from Jan 29-31. The event is one of the biggest travel and tourism platforms showcasing India’s tourism potential to the world by bringing the global tourism market to India.

Starting February 15, an individual user will be able to book online a maximum of 6 tickets in a month on IRCTC website. This will replace the existing system under which a maximum of 10 tickets can be booked online through IRCTC website in a month by an individual. However, the existing condition will continue wherein these booking will be subject to a limit of booking two opening Tatkal tickets in 10:00- 12:00 hours period in a day and two opening Advance Reservation Period (ARP) tickets in 08:00-10:00 hours period in a day. This has been done keeping in view the analysis of usage of quota of 10 tickets which indicated that 90 per cent of users are booking upto 6 tickets in a given month and only 10 per cent are making more than 6 tickets. It is suspected that the 10 per cent users might be involved in touting activities. Therefore, to deter such touts and to facilitate genuine users, it has been decided that a maximum of 6 tickets can be booked by an individual user in a month.