The Hindu : Fierce race in the domestic skies

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Nov 07, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu

Fierce race in the domestic skies

By T.S. Shankar

CHENNAI NOV. 6. Even as private and national carriers are effecting an across-the-board 10 per cent hike in the basic fare from November 10, the airline sector is witnessing stiff competition especially on Mumbai and New Delhi routes what with operators vying with one another to woo passengers from Chennai.

Be it the national carrier, Indian Airlines, the Mumbai-based Jet Airways or the New Delhi-based Air Sahara, all carriers are offering fare concessions and also providing better connectivity between Chennai and Mumbai and Chennai and Delhi. A new trend is the offer of day-return service, by which the passengers will avoid spending a night at a destination.

While the participating airlines have adopted different names for attracting the "untapped domestic market traffic", apart from wooing the regular travellers, Indian Airlines, in its winter schedule, has enhanced its Mumbai and Chennai operations.

"We now have four flights daily, offering more than 680 seats, deploying three Airbus-320s and one Airbus-300 between Mumbai and Chennai", an IA spokesperson told The Hindu, emphasising the market-friendly initiatives taken by the airline.

On the New Delhi-Chennai route, IA operates four Airbus-320s, offering 145 seats per flight.

Jet Airways is "providing a choice of connections, offering every two and a half hours a link to Mumbai from Chennai. It's almost like a shuttle service, with 800 seats, linking the two metros daily. We have over 300 seats in the New Delhi sector", airline sources said.

Jet Airways has announced introduction of a daily Hyderabad link, besides increasing the twice-a-day New Delhi connection to thrice a day with effect from November 22. These routes are being added with the induction of the 32nd aircraft into its fleet.

Turning the race more competitive, Air Sahara has unveiled mega-plans to make Chennai its fourth hub, and its plans to link Mumbai with three daily services.

"We have kick-started our Chennai-based operations with two services to New Delhi daily, one direct and the other operated via Bangalore", Air Sahara sources said.

Referring to this development, D. Sudhakar Reddy, president, Air Passengers' Association of India, said competition in the aviation sector would ensure to travellers not only convenient air links but also competitive fares.

But the carriers were hiking fares again, citing an escalation in the operational cost especially levy of a sales tax on the Aviation Turbine Fuel, which is the highest in Tamil Nadu, said Mr. Reddy.

Jet Airways has announced a hike of 10 per cent in the basic fare. Under the new fare slab, Chennai-Delhi one-way fare will be Rs. 14, 935, up from Rs. 13, 620 now.

Though it has not come out with the reasons for the rise, sources in the airline attributed the hike to an increase in the operational cost especially of ATF and the sales tax levy.

Indian Airlines has also announced a fare hike of 10 per cent, but Air Sahara is waiting for a final decision from its New Delhi office.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Southern States

Stories in this Section

STF pulled back at Karnataka instance

$ 35 million for AIDS control

TN Govt. will challenge temple takeover

School dropout takes wing on Kalam vision

Tamil TV networks to turn pay channels

A comforting meeting, says Vaiko

Fierce race in the domestic skies

Ramadoss, G. K. Mani get contempt notice

Matric schools can't admit students to Tamil medium sections

Trade bandh at Tiruvannamalai

`Cleaning up the system, key to combating corruption'

Karunanidhi rebuts Minister's remarks

Anti-conversion Bill should have gone to select panel: Swamy