Tag Archives: Mumbai

SpiceJet has announced non-stop flights connecting Delhi and Mumbai with London’s Heathrow airport from December 4. With this announcement, SpiceJet would become the third Indian airline, and the first low-cost carrier, to fly to London. The new connections come under the air bubble agreement with UK. “SpiceJet will operate thrice-a-week to London including twice from Delhi and once-a-week from Mumbai,” revealed Ajay Singh, CMD, SpiceJet on a virtual event for announcement of the new flight. SpiceJet will use an Airbus A330-900 Neo aircraft for these flights. This is a huge milestone for us and I am proud of the fact that SpiceJet will be the first Indian low-cost airline to operate non-stop long-haul flights to the UK. London is one of the busiest long-haul destinations from India and our convenient flight timings should suit the convenience of our passengers perfectly,” added Singh.

Virgin Atlantic has announced its plan to restart passenger flying to 17 additional destinations from August 2020. According to a statement released by the airline, flights from Delhi and Mumbai to London Heathrow start on the 2nd Sept 2020 and will provide connections to a range of US destinations. After the airline’s announcement that services from London Heathrow to Hong Kong, New York JFK, and Los Angeles are expected to resume from 20th and 21st July 2020, Virgin Atlantic has unveiled more detailed plans that will see passenger flying restart to many destinations across the airline’s network. Juha Jarvinen, Chief Commercial Officer, Virgin Atlantic commented: “As countries around the world begin to relax travel restrictions, we look forward to welcoming our customers back onboard and flying them safely to many destinations across our network. From 20th July we will resume services to New York, Los Angeles and Hong Kong then from 1st August onwards, we will resume passenger flying to 17 additional destinations around the world including Delhi, Mumbai and Tel Aviv.” “However, we are monitoring external conditions extremely closely, in particular the travel restrictions many countries have in place including the 14 day quarantine policy for travellers entering the UK. We know that as the Covid-19 crisis subsides, air travel will be a vital enabler of the UK’s economic recovery. Therefore, we are calling for UK Government to continually review its quarantine measures and instead look at a multi-layered approach of carefully targeted public health and screening measures, including air bridges, which will support a successful and safe restart of international air travel for passengers and businesses.” Virgin Atlantic planned return to flying from London Heathrow Terminal 2* (subject …

According to the data released by South African Tourism office in India, Mumbai continued to be the leading source market for South Africa in India. Between January to June 2019, around 43% of total Indian visitors to the Rainbow Nation were from Mumbai. Delhi managed to be the second leading source market for the destination in India contributing 21% of the total Indian visitors during the same period. One thing remained common for both cities – the summer and winter holiday months of April, May and December emerged as preferred travel months among Mumbaikars as well as Delhiites for their South Africa trips. With 81,316 Indian arrivals as of October 2019, the destination board shared a positive outlook for the Indian market, noting that as of September 2019, total spends by Indian travellers in South Africa had reached a four-year high. The average length of stay witnessed a year on year increase of 8% in the first half of 2019.

The second premium Tejas train has started plying between Ahmedabad and Mumbai, which was flagged off by Chief Minister of Gujarat, Vijay Rupani from Ahmedabad. It has started its commercial run, in line with the success of semi-high speed and fully air-conditioned Lucknow-Delhi Tejas Express. Passengers can book their tickets for the train exclusively on IRCTC website and its mobile app ‘Irctc Rail Connect’. There will be no booking at railway reservation counters. However, passengers can get their tickets booked through IRCTC authorised agents. The train will also be available for booking through IRCTC’s online travel portal partners. The fully air-conditioned train shall have two Executive Class Chair Cars having 56 seats each and Eight Chair Cars having capacity of 78 seats each. The total carrying capacity of the train will be 736 passengers.  The train will start its journey ex Ahmedabad in the morning at 06:40 hours and will reach Mumbai Central at 13.10 hours having scheduled commercial halts at Nadiad, Vadodara, Bharuch, Surat, Vapi and Borivali. For the return journey, the train will leave Mumbai Central at 15:40 hours and will reach Ahmedabad at 21:55 hours having scheduled halts at Borivali, Vapi, Surat, Bharuch, Vadodara and Nadiad. Train will run on all days of the week except Thursday. Train fare will be dynamic in nature keeping in consideration the prevailing bus, taxi, rail and airfares. Train will have different series of fares for lean, busy and festive seasons. Further, train fares will be on point to point basis. There will be no tatkal quota or premium tatkal quota in the train. There will be only General Quota and Foreign Tourist Quota. Foreign Tourist Quota of 6 seats in …

Sarovar Hotels & Resorts has launched Royal Hometel Suites in Mumbai. The hotel features 112 rooms & suites and features two banquet halls to conduct conferences, wedding and social gathering which can accommodate up to 550 guests. Anil Madhok, Executive Chairman, Sarovar Hotels & Resorts, said, “The opening of Royal Hometel Suites strengthens our position in the Mumbai market in line with the brand’s growth strategy. The launch follows the growing trend of business and leisure hotels along with the brand’s quality assurance and ‘Signature Sarovar Hospitality’. Our new property is appropriate for both business and leisure travellers considering the location of the hotel.”

The Indian trade delegation that is currently in France to attend the annual show Rendezvous en France 2019 organised by Atout France has been exploring the potential of regions yet unfamiliar to the Indian travellers. The 32-member delegation hosted by Atout France India includes tour operators from Mumbai, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Chennai and Bengaluru. The regions that the Indian delegates found appealing for their clients include Provence and the Rhône-Alpes. The two-day show is being held in Marseille this year to promote the region in the international markets. About 915 tour operators from 73 different countries are attending this B2B travel show, one of the biggest trade events in France.

Atout France Tourism Development Agency and La Vallée Village organised an informal networking exchange in the form of an aperitif for key representatives of the trade at the recently-concluded second edition of the Luxury Lifestyle Weekend held at Jio Gardens in BKC Mumbai. This interaction allowed the guests an opportunity to actively engage in discussions and interact with Patrick Allais, Business Development Manager, La Vallée Village. He apprised the guests on all the latest offerings available for their clients at La Vallée Village.

Qatar Airways has introduced a new online payment scheme for bookings made on its website exclusively for customers with credit cards issued by Indian banks. The new payment option now makes it possible for passengers to pay for their booking through monthly instalments of 3, 6, 9 or 12 months respectively. The service aims to ease and enhance passengers’ travelling experience by making their booking transactions much more affordable and flexible. It also makes it easier for travellers planning to fly with family and friends, with only a minimum installment fee needed to be paid to complete the purchase. Naveen Chawla, Senior Manager Commercial–ISC, Qatar Airways said, “The launch of the new EMI option gives our passengers tremendous benefits as they can now book their tickets online at their convenience through our website, and also instantly access our latest offers. Through this new user-friendly and affordable payment scheme, Qatar Airways passengers with credit cards issued by Indian banks will now have greater flexibility when it comes to planning their travel itinerary. Those who previously couldn’t book online due to their credit limit or a large outstanding balance will now be able to pay for their bookings effortlessly using their credit card. This service is testament to Qatar Airways’ ongoing commitment to be innovative when it comes to enhancing the travel experience of our customers.” Qatar Airways currently operates 102 weekly flights between Doha and 13 destinations in India, including Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Goa, Hyderabad, Kochi, Kolkata, Kozhikode, Mumbai, Nagpur and Thiruvananthapuram.  

The Indian travel trade welcomed nine companies from Ireland during Tourism Ireland’s India Sales Mission that concluded recently. Its aim was to facilitate the Irish industry to engage with Indian travel professionals who are currently selling the island of Ireland, or who have strong potential to sell the destination and to position Ireland as one of the most desirable destinations for travellers from India. Business links between tourism companies from Ireland and influential travel professionals in India were strengthened during the sales mission, through a busy programme of workshops, presentations and networking events. Siobhan McManamy, Director of Markets, Tourism Ireland said, “Our sales mission is a key element of our promotional programme in India. It will give our tourism partners a platform to inform and influence the Indian travel trade about what the island of Ireland has to offer and, importantly, encourage them to include the destination in their brochures and programmes. Tourism Ireland is committed to growing visitor numbers to the island of Ireland from India and our sales mission will play a significant role in helping us achieve this goal.” The workshops were held in Mumbai and Delhi with over 100 leading travel agents and tour operators in attendance. The companies who were represented at the event include Fáilte Ireland, Tourism Northern Ireland, Guinness Storehouse, Winterfell Castle – Game of Thrones Visitor Attraction, Stena Line, Hotel Solutions, The Savoy Hotel, Andras House Group and Irish Rugby Tours.  

Registering an annual traffic of over 89.1 million for 2018, Dubai International (DXB) has retained its position as the world’s busiest airport for the fifth consecutive year with Indian travellers emerging as the largest source of traffic for the airport. India continued to hold to its position as Dubai’s top destination country by passenger numbers, with traffic for the year reaching 12,279,485 – propelled mainly by top destinations like Mumbai, Delhi and Kochi. Saudi Arabia was number two on the list with 6,471,142 customers, followed closely by the United Kingdom with 6,284,771 customers. Other destination countries of note include the US (3,205,524 customers) and the fast-growing markets of China (3,512,075) with 6 per cent growth and Russia (1,533,654) which grew 14.5 per cent. The top three cities were London (3,817,889 customers), Mumbai (2,540,750) and Kuwait (2,194,576). Eastern Europe was the fastest growing region with double-digit growth of 16.7 per cent, followed by CIS at 12.9 per cent and Africa growing 9.8 per cent. A statement released by the airport said that the annual traffic at the major transit hub rose just over 1 per cent to 89.15 million passengers in comparison to 2017. Although the figure was a new record high, it missed on the 90.3 million passengers that Dubai airport had projected for 2018.