Indian airlines are fiercely debating proposed policy changes which they fear could result in Arabian Gulf carriers being given an unfair advantage to expand in the country. The areas of India’s draft civil aviation policy which have raised concerns include plans to liberalise and auction bilateral flying rights and raise the cap on foreign direct investment in Indian carriers,...
Jet Airways, India’s premier international airline, has entered into a codeshare agreement and a reciprocal frequent flyer programme partnership with Korean Air, the largest airline in South Korea. Guests travelling on both Jet Airways and Korean Air will be able to connect from multiple points in India to Seoul over various gateway points in Asia. Under the codeshare arrangement, Jet Air...
How can airlines flying on the same route with the same type of aircraft have varying flight durations? The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has called a meeting of domestic airlines to standardise the block hours — the actual flying time on important routes. “How can an airline have a inflated block time of two hours twenty minutes on a sector when another airline ha...
The NDA government on Saturday indicated the possibility of its exit from Air India and from the hospital sector, a month after a committee of secretaries recommended that it start planning to get out of air services. “In times to come, the DoPT will chalk out a possible plan for exit of government sectors from hospitals, air services, etc, and a sunset clause will be attached to every ne...
If local media reports are to be believed, India’s government is inching closer to the final draft of its civil aviation policy – a wide-ranging rulebook that will map out the regulatory landscape for the country’s airlines. We’ve been here before, of course. Government officials had pledged to unveil the document last September – culminating more than a year of st...
The Airports Authority of India (AAI) is looking at an incentive-based scheme to attract commercial airlines and general aviation companies to adopt India’s “GPS Aided GEO Augmented Navigation” (Gagan)–which is equivalent to Europe’s EGNOS and the U.S. WAAS system, but for the Indian subcontinent. As such, Gagan will be the firs...
Air India pilots flew back to India a plane grounded by authorities at Sharjah airport, prompting the national carrier to bar a senior captain from operating international flights for violating regulations. The incident drew a sharp response from UAE’s general civil aviation authority (GCAA), which threatened to ban the aircraft from entering the country’s airspace. The carrier late...
National carrier Air India (AI) has decided to dock salaries of pilots who pull out of flights for which they are rostered for at the eleventh hour. According to the new pay structure cleared by the government, if a pilot refuses to operate a flight, which he has been rostered for, he would be liable for reduction of double flight hours from his flying allowance. The new pay structure, as fi...
ExecuJet Aviation Group is set to expand into the Indian market for the first time, following a successful tender bid for new fixed-based operation (FBO) and maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) facilities at Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi, India. Together with its Indian partner, The Bird Group, ExecuJet has been awarded one of a limited number of licences to develop, const...
The flight has, however, now returned to Delhi from Lahore as the flight duty time limitation of the crew came into effect, and the aircraft would depart for its destination tomorrow morning, airport sources said. An Air France' Paris-bound flight carrying 374 passengers was diverted to Lahore shortly after taking off from the Indira Gandhi International Airport here this morning due to a m...
Jet Airways on Saturday posted a record quarterly profit for the three months to the end of December thanks to low fuel prices and high passenger numbers, helped by the success of its strategic partnership with Etihad Airways. The airline declared a net profit of 4.67 billion rupees (Dh252.7 million) for the period, which marked its third consecutive profitable quarter and compares to a profit...
He is one of the highest-paid actors of Bollywood, but there are things that even Shah Rukh Khan can’t buy. SRK says he aspires to buy a plane, but is running low on funds as he has used them up to make films. “I want to buy a plane but I don’t have money. I put all my money in my films. I would really like to travel in a private plane because I can do a lot more work. One d...
