Category Archives: Aviation

In a written statement, Air Asia India has clarified with TAAI that they are not going out of business. The statement by Ankur Garg, CCO, Air Asia India, pointed out, “While the current pandemic has severely impacted the aviation sector and AirAsia India is no exception, we have remained adequately capitalized throughout these months by securing the funding from our majority shareholder as and when required.” He further said that they continue to grow their network and are already at ~55% of their pre-COVID capacity and looking to increase to 70% as per the recent relaxed capacity mandate from the government last week. They have also recently added a brand new A320 NEO to their fleet in Oct, adding a 2nd NEO in Nov and will add another 3 aircraft in as many months. Giving another evidence of the financial stability of AirAsia India, Garg reveals that they have been smoothly processing all refunds in the last few months and never forced a conversion of bookings during lockdown to “credit shells”. In the months of Sep-Oct, Air Asia leadership proactively engaged in regional meetings with travel agent partners across the entire country and addressed any questions on refunds, long term growth plans, etc. On the employee front, we have not retrenched any staff and have not done salary cuts for employees earning less than Rs 50,000 per month, and also no delay in salary pay-outs has happened for any month since the pandemic, he informed. Citing these points, Garg said that he hopes that it would dispel any doubts and provide enough confidence in the financial sustainability and growth plans of AirAsia India.

IATA is in the final development phase of the IATA Travel Pass, a digital health pass that will support the safe reopening of borders. The Pass will manage and verify the secure flow of necessary testing or vaccine information among governments, airlines, laboratories and travellers.

IATA has announced that Alexandre de Juniac, its Director General and CEO, will step down from his role at the association effective March 31, 2021. He made known his intention to step down several months ago. The IATA Board of Governors will recommend the appointment of Willie Walsh, former CEO of International Airlines Group to become IATA’s eighth Director General from April 1, 2021.

The first direct flight operations from Kalaburagi, Karnataka to Hindon Airport, Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh was recently flagged off under the RCS-UDAN (Regional Connectivity Scheme – Ude Desh Ka Aam Nagrik). The officials of Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) and Airport Authority of India (AAI) were present at the launch.

Access to technology that reduces human contact, queues and physical touchpoints is the ultimate factor that would need to be fulfilled for Indian respondents to feel comfortable travelling (40%), according to a recent study by Amadeus titled ‘Rethink Travel Global Survey India insights 2020’.

Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said that air travel in India will reach pre-COVID level by the end of current year or early January. He also urged people to continue to maintain safety protocol with self-discipline.

Lufthansa Group (LHG) airlines, Lufthansa, and SWISS will be the first to use the new Star Alliance Biometrics for elected flights in Frankfurt and Munich from mid-November. The new system is available via the app and Lufthansa Miles & More members will be able to pass through boarding and security without contact and have a touchless experience at airport.

Air India will operate additional flights between India and the UK from December 11, 2020 until March 27, 2021. Also, the national carrier will operate additional flights between India & France from 3rd January to 22nd March, 2021 under the air bubble agreement. The UK flight will be Delhi-Amritsar-Birmingham every Friday and Birmingham-Amritsar-Delhi every Saturday. Bookings are now open. These flights are in addition to the existing flights operating between India and the UK.  The new Delhi-Paris flights will be operating four days a week in the new year – from Delhi to Paris on Thursdays and Sundays, and from Paris to Delhi on Mondays and Fridays

According to data received from Cleartrip, flight booking volumes have doubled since July-August due to significant amount of pent-up demand and have reached around 50% levels of the last year.

Aloke Singh has taken charge as the new CEO of Air India Express with tenure of three years. The former Senior Advisor- Airline Consulting, CAPA South Asia who has also worked with Oman Air as Chief Officer Network Planning takes over from K Shyam Sundar, who was leading the airline since March 2014. The profitable low-cost arm of Air India reported its highest-ever net profit of Rs 412.77 cr in financial year ending March.