Mumbai airport has announced its expansion of existing flight frequency to the United Kingdom with Virgin Atlantic. The added flight frequency in the BOM-LHR route that began operations from 28th October 2019 to collectively boost CSMIA’s passenger traffic by 27%. Additionally, CSMIA also inaugurated the launch of Air India’s flights to Kuwait and Columbo on 27th October 2019

The Hahn Air Group has announced the launch of a new company—Hahn Air Technologies, which will provide distribution services to airlines that are looking to expand their indirect ticket sales. It will also be an innovation centre and think tank for the Hahn Air Group by exploring and developing the potential of new distribution channels such as NDC, blockchain-based providers and mobile solutions. In fact, the first product of Hahn Air Technologies is X1-Air, which when used by airlines that have limited or no indirect distribution connectivity, can immediately make their flights available in various sales channels. Aside from interfaces with major GDS, such as Amadeus and Sabre and soon Travelport, the service package of Hahn Air Technologies and X1-Air includes scheduling, fare filing, messaging, inventory management as well as booking, ticketing and settlement. More GDSs will be added to the service in the near future. The first partner airlines to use the services of Hahn Air Technologies are Air Panama (7P) from Panama, ASL Airline France (5O) from France, Azur Air Ukraine (QU) from Ukraine, Jam Airlink Express (J0) from Jamaica, Mayair (5G) from Mexico, Ulendo Airlink (W4) from Malawi, Westair Aviation (WV) from Namibia and Wildcat Touring (WC) from the United States. “Our products complete any airline’s distribution strategy. X1-Air allows low-cost airlines to outsource their complete indirect distribution in a simple, risk free and cost-efficient manner. For regional airlines we provide easy access to a truly global distribution network of over 100,000 travel agencies in 190 markets. For all airlines which only have direct distribution channels, X1-Air is the perfect first step to enter indirect distribution”, says Alexander Proschka, Head of Hahn Air Technologies,” says Proschka.

Indian Railways has introduced a new OTP based refund system for tickets booked through authorised railway ticketing agents. The move is believed to forge a transparent and customer friendly refund system for reserved e-tickets which are cancelled or which are fully wait-listed dropped tickets. This system will be implemented by Indian Railway Catering & Tourism Corporation Limited (IRCTC). The OTP (One time Password) will be received as SMS on the registered mobile number of the passenger (provided by the customer/passenger to the agent at the time of booking). The customer/passenger will be required to share the OTP with the agent who booked the ticket, for getting the refund amount. This user-friendly facility would allow the passenger to know about the exact refund amount received by agent on his behalf against cancelled ticket or fully waitlisted dropped ticket. The objective of the scheme is to streamline the cancellation refund process further so that cancellation amount is refunded timely to the customer by the agents. In order to avail this facility, customers are advised to provide correct mobile no. of one of the passengers to the IRCTC authorised agent at the time of booking reserved rail e-tickets. Also, they should ensure that the agent records his or her mobile no. correctly at the time of booking reserved rail e-tickets. The passengers need to note that only IRCTC authorised agents are permitted to book reserved rail e-tickets to the customer. Also, they should note that OTP based refund for cancelled tickets or fully waitlisted dropped tickets, will be processed only if the ticket is booked through IRCTC authorised agents.

In a recent announcement, Ethiopian Airlines has revealed it will be flying four times a week on Addis Ababa-Bengaluru route, making the tech hub its third destination in India after Mumbai and New Delhi to have direct connectivity. The flight will operate on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday on Boeing 737-800 and the flight duration will be of 6 hours and 30 minutes. The flight will take off at 23:00 hours (GMT+3) and will land at Bengaluru airport at 8 am local time.

Ark Travels has successfully completed a 21-city roadshow in India. The roadshows planned and executed in association with Genting Cruise Lines and Dream Cruises was to educate travel trade about the services, new offers, value-add-ons and benefits of cruising. Events were organised in major metro cities like Delhi, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Mumbai (seven events including Thane and New Mumbai) and Chennai, along with tier two cities such as Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Lucknow and Mangalore. The company primarily in business of selling international cruise vacations to Indian travellers, is also the first to touch base with travel agents by hosting cruise specific roadshows in cities like Dehradun, Agra, Pondicherry, Coimbatore and Madurai. To further reward its travel partners, Ark Travels organised a familiarisation trip onboard Dream Cruises’ newest cruise ship – Explorer Dream. To add on to their experience, agents were hosted in Singapore and were taken to Hong Kong on a Jetstar chartered flight by Genting Cruise Lines to board the cruise. In total, 64 travel agents were hosted from across India for the inaugural five-night-sailing itinerary on Explorer Dream giving agents opportunity to explore destinations like Hong Kong – Nha Trang – Ho Chi Minh City – Singapore.

To make Goa the number one adventure hub in the country, Goa Tourism Development Corporation (GTDC) is offering several adventure sports such as river rafting, scuba diving, parasailing, paragliding, and hot air ballooning. Nikhil Desai, MD, GTDC, shares, “We have introduced India’s second highest bungee jumping facility at Mayem Lake and have tied up with reputed private operators to ensure safety.” A full-fledged family theme park is also in the offing here. Desai also adds, “In addition, we are introducing several new tourism facilities like an underwater submarine, giant wheels, and bike tourism circuits that would allow tourists to hire bikes and go to nearby places like Hampi. A hanging restaurant, which would go up to 100 metres in the sky, is also in the offing, and would allow people to get a great view of Goa while enjoying their food.”

India has a lot of potential for festival tourism, said, Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his montly radio programme Mann ki Baat. Modi also said that India presented immense possibilities for festival tourism as it is called ‘land of festival’. He added, “We must try to popularise our festivals such as Holi, Diwali, Onam, Pongal and Bihu and invite people from other states and countries too to join the festivities.”

Senior IAS officer Arvind Singh has been appointed as the chairman of Airports Authority of India and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu will head the National Highways Authority of India as part of a major bureaucratic reshuffle effected by the Centre. Singh is at present working in his cadre-state Maharashtra. He has been appointed as the chief of AAI in the rank and pay of additional secretary, an order issued by the personnel ministry said.

India, with 221,000 cruise passengers and a growth of 28.1%in 2018 as compared to 2017, is ranked at sixth position in Asia, when it comes to number of cruise passengers, according to Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA). China topped the list with 2,357,000 passengers, despite a decline of 1.6% from 2017. It was followed by Taiwan with 391,000 passengers (+4.7%) and Singapore with 373,000 passengers (+39.9%). Japan ranked 4th with 266,000 passengers (+4.5%)  and Hong Kong ranked 5th with 250,000 (+8.6%).

The countries that have seen the most flight bookings to India for the period around Diwali are the United States (32,828), the United Kingdom (22,663) and the United Arab Emirates (20,688) until October 14, 2019, according to an analysis conducted by Travelport. This data is derived from Travelport’s interpretation of relevant MIDT data. It reflects bookings made as of 14 October 2019 through GDS only, a channel primarily used by travel agents, for flights to India (the destination) between 24 and 30 October 2019. Additional bookings will have been made directly with airlines, which may or may not also have a GDS presence. On a volume basis, the Americas saw the most travellers flying into India (49,157; or 32% of total bookings made in the top 10 countries), followed closely by the Middle East (44,831; 29%). Europe (30,354; 19%) and the Asia Pacific (29,093; 19%) rounded out the list.