Category Archives: Aviation

Expanding its network, AirAsia India has launched new flights to Kochi and Ahmedabad from Delhi effective December 20. The inaugural starting fares on these new routes between New Delhi-Kochi and New Delhi- Ahmedabad are priced attractively at Rs 3915 and Rs 2015 respectively. Flight no i5791 from New Delhi departs at 4:55 hours and lands in Kochi at 08:00 hours while flight i5792 fly back to New Delhi from Kochi at 08:50 hours and reaches the destination at 12:00 hours. Flight i5795 from New Delhi departs at 21:30 hours and reaches Ahmedabad at 23:05 hours. On its way back to New Delhi, flight i5769 departs at 23:35 hours and lands in New Delhi at 01:05 hours.  The low-cost carrier now flies to 21 destinations pan-India with a fleet of 27 A320 aircraft. While launching flights to Kochi and Ahmedabad, the newly appointed Chief Commercial Officer of the airline, Ankur Garg said, “We continue to strengthen our network across India. I am confident that, with the robust expansion plans we have chalked out for 2020-2021, we will be able to offer our services on many more new routes.” AirAsia India flew 7.60 lakh passengers in November with a 5.9 per cent market share.

IndiGo has achieved the feat of having 1500 daily departures across its network of 83 domestic and international destinations. IndiGo expanded its operations to 11 domestic and 8 international new destinations inclusive of multiple exclusive and virgin routes, increasing its portfolio by 22 percent, between January to December 2019. Ronojoy Dutta, CEO, IndiGo said, “We are very pleased to be the first Indian airline to touch 1500 daily departures, with one flight taking off every minute. The simple philosophy of offering low fares and on-time, courteous, hassle-free service has been the foundation of IndiGo’s growth and unparalleled network in India. Flying over 2,50,000 customers every day, we are on a mission to promote trade, tourism and economic growth by increasing mobility and accessibility across the length and breadth of the country”.

Domestic air passenger traffic for November was fastest in 2019, carrying 12.95 million people in November, up 11.2% year-on-year, revealed Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). This was the fastest growth recorded since December last year. This growth can be attributed to SpiceJet, which carried two million passengers in the month, a jump of 43% year-on-year. IndiGo, on the other hand carried six million passengers, up 21%. GoAir’s passenger traffic increased 39.5% to 1.4 million, while that of Air India increased by 10% to 1.5 million. The recent data revealed that passengers carried by domestic airlines during Jan-Nov 2019 were 1311.54 lakhs as against 1262.83 lakhs during the corresponding period of previous year hereby registering annual growth of 3.86%.

US-based Delta Air Lines will restart its Mumbai-New York JFK non-stop, daily flight service from December 24, 2019. The airline is starting the flight after a decade as it used to fly this route till 2009. Its last flight in India, connecting Mumbai and Amsterdam, was in 2015. The relaunched flight will take off at 12.55 am from Mumbai on December 24, on a renovated Boeing 777-200LR aircraft and will land at New York’s JFK airport, 16 hours later. Jimmy Eichelgruen, Director- Sales for Africa, Middle East and Indian subcontinent, Delta Air Lines was in Mumbai recently to announce this. He said, “Delta’s return to India will ensure that Mumbai is even better connected to the United States. There will be 14 flights per week and the flying time will be 16 hours.” The airline has an existing interline agreement with Air India and has just established an interline agreement with Vistara. “We will first develop and establish out interline agreements with Indian airlines and once they are stabilized, we will explore codeshare,” Eichelgruen adds. Delta earlier had a codeshare agreement with Jet Airways which suspended operations in April 2019.

RwandAir has announced that effective January 1, 2020, the airline will cut down the IATA agent commission to 0% from the current 3%. Announcing a revision in its commission structure, RwandAir revealed that the 3% commission would only be effective till December 31, 2019, and starting 2020, there will be no commission for agents. The airline thanked the trade fraternity for their support.

Five unserved airports in Haryana, namely Bhiwani, Hisar, Karnal, Narnaul and Sirsa, are now available for bidding under UDAN 4.0, revealed Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA). The opening of these five airports would give a boost to regional connectivity and promote tourism opportunities in the state, claimed MoCA in a tweet recently. MoCA has opened bidding for many such airports in different states recently.  

AirAsia India has appointed Ankur Garg as its Chief Commercial Officer in place of Sanjay Kumar, who stepped down from the position last month. Garg was the Vice-president for revenue management, ancillary revenue and distribution for IndiGo. In his new role, Garg will be managing day-to-day commercial operations of AirAsia India, including network and revenue management, marketing & sales and cargo.

In its latest report, CAPA has forecast that Indian airlines will post a combined loss of $600 million and induct fewer aircraft in the current financial year. In June, CAPA reported that Indian carriers will post $500-700 million in profit. However, owing to weak results by IndiGo and SpiceJet, CAPA’s latest forecast reports losses by Indian carriers. IndiGo and SpiceJet posted losses of Rs 1,062 crore and Rs 462 crore, respectively, in the quarter ending September. According to CAPA, IndiGo will post an annual profit of $70-90 million, which is much lower that the $400-500 million forecast in June.  AirAsia India, Vistara, and Air India are also likely to post losses, while GoAir is expected to register a $25-30 million profit. CAPA estimates Air India to post a loss of $500 million this year.

According to the recent data released by Directorate General of Civil Aviation, passengers carried by domestic airlines during Jan-Nov 2019 were 1311.54 lakhs as against 1262.83 lakhs during the corresponding period of previous year thereby registering annual growth of 3.86% and monthly growth of 11.18%. In the month of October, MoM growth was 3.98% which shows November has performed phenomenally well.

Jewar Airport will come up in 5,000 hectare area when fully constructed and is estimated to cost Rs 29,560 crore. Zurich Airport International AG will develop this airport on the outskirts of Delhi. The proposed airport is said to have six runways, at par with a few world’s largest airports like Chicago O’Hare International Airport and Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. The airport in Uttar Pradesh’s Gautam Buddh Nagar district will be the third in the National Capital Region after Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport and in Ghaziabad’s Hindon.