avier wrote:

CCU/DEL remain safe bets for such launches. They can test the waters in that region from these two cities. They can even look towards the more affluent northeast asia, to places like South Korea/Taiwan/Japan on their A321Neo XLR's.

There's a lot of IT traffic to Vietnam. Perhaps we could see a route from BLR before long

edealinfo wrote:

Yakamoz wrote:

sibibom wrote:

They are going to get nada! And deservingly so.

Why?

Simple. They support Pakistan’s position over India’s as it relates to Kash, and then they ask for like 10 additional daily frequencies . They just don’t know how to play this politically even though the writing is on the wall. Their best chance is to have asked for an additional frequency to Amritsar alone which is the aviation minister’s constituency and obtained local business and religious support for the flight which would give the minister enough political cover to provide the right to that 1x daily flight without stirring a hornet’s nest. But, the dummies, instead, ask for the moon. too bad they don’t have formal courses on effective lobbying in India.

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.

WRT Indigo’s CCU mini hub for SE Asia, good for them Glad CCU is finally benefitting from something (in this case geography and the economics of narrow bodies). I hope Indigo is making an effort in simplifying the transit process and helping people (meaning not just relying/blaming CCU airport)

CaliguyNYC wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Yakamoz wrote:

Why?

Simple. They support Pakistan’s position over India’s as it relates to Kash, and then they ask for like 10 additional daily frequencies . They just don’t know how to play this politically even though the writing is on the wall. Their best chance is to have asked for an additional frequency to Amritsar alone which is the aviation minister’s constituency and obtained local business and religious support for the flight which would give the minister enough political cover to provide the right to that 1x daily flight without stirring a hornet’s nest. But, the dummies, instead, ask for the moon. too bad they don’t have formal courses on effective lobbying in India.

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.

WRT Indigo’s CCU mini hub for SE Asia, good for them Glad CCU is finally benefitting from something (in this case geography and the economics of narrow bodies). I hope Indigo is making an effort in simplifying the transit process and helping people (meaning not just relying/blaming CCU airport)

I agree with you, but IF the bilaterals get modified they will be moved to a seats limitation than a frequency limitation. All the frequency based bilaterals that you see in India are legacy/old agreements

CaliguyNYC wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Yakamoz wrote:

Why?

Simple. They support Pakistan’s position over India’s as it relates to Kash, and then they ask for like 10 additional daily frequencies . They just don’t know how to play this politically even though the writing is on the wall. Their best chance is to have asked for an additional frequency to Amritsar alone which is the aviation minister’s constituency and obtained local business and religious support for the flight which would give the minister enough political cover to provide the right to that 1x daily flight without stirring a hornet’s nest. But, the dummies, instead, ask for the moon. too bad they don’t have formal courses on effective lobbying in India.

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.)

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

In 2018, India’s exports to Turkey were USD 7 billion while Turkey’s exports to India were USD 750 million. In 2019, India’s number is supposed to go up to USD 8 billion while Turkey’s export figure would be about 1 billion. With the trade imbalance in India‘s favour to the tune of USD 7 billion, the Indian government would be foolish to choke off the export pipeline for the sake of a few landing slots. As a rhetoric comparison, Pakistan exported USD 300 million to Turkey and imported USD 600 million.

TK aimed at the moon with the hope of hitting at least the treetops. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised by TK getting 3 to 5 additional daily frequencies to India with caps on permitted seat numbers.

TK suffered right along with other airlines when Pakistani aerospace was closed for three months earlier this year. If this were to happen again, maybe the Indian government could hypothetically use Turkish pressure on Pakistan as a behind-the-scenes measure.

TEMPO wrote:

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

Absolutely. The only country in India's "neighbourhood" that has managed to score a significant increase in bilateral rights in the recent years has been Saudi Arabia, in exchange for massive investment commitments and other diplomatic concessions. Perhaps India will use this as a bargaining chip for further trade benefits.

unrave wrote:

Did they really ask for 10 daily frequencies?

I am not sure what they asked for this time around but in Dec 2018, they asked for about as much. Below is a link to that previous request and a clip as well

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.thehin ... 8.ece/amp/

“Turkish Airlines plans to expand its operations in India with direct flights to Chennai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Amritsar and Bengaluru. It also plans to double its operations in Mumbai and Delhi.”

The Minister has gone on record within the past month that bilateral flights would not be increased to (West Asia or the Gulf — not sure which phrase he used) because of ongoing investigations into previous increases in the bilaterals and the Comptroller (or Auditor General) past accusations that bilaterals were inappropriately increased. The Government may also be taken to task if increased bilaterals results in additional hub capacity outside India. Note that rights to Saudi were allowed to increase because the Government felt that hardly anyone would use Saudia for onward connections

TEMPO wrote:

CaliguyNYC wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Simple. They support Pakistan’s position over India’s as it relates to Kash, and then they ask for like 10 additional daily frequencies . They just don’t know how to play this politically even though the writing is on the wall. Their best chance is to have asked for an additional frequency to Amritsar alone which is the aviation minister’s constituency and obtained local business and religious support for the flight which would give the minister enough political cover to provide the right to that 1x daily flight without stirring a hornet’s nest. But, the dummies, instead, ask for the moon. too bad they don’t have formal courses on effective lobbying in India.

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.)

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

In 2018, India’s exports to Turkey were USD 7 billion while Turkey’s exports to India were USD 750 million. In 2019, India’s number is supposed to go up to USD 8 billion while Turkey’s export figure would be about 1 billion. With the trade imbalance in India‘s favour to the tune of USD 7 billion, the Indian government would be foolish to choke off the export pipeline for the sake of a few landing slots. As a rhetoric comparison, Pakistan exported USD 300 million to Turkey and imported USD 600 million.

TK aimed at the moon with the hope of hitting at least the treetops. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised by TK getting 3 to 5 additional daily frequencies to India with caps on permitted seat numbers.

TK suffered right along with other airlines when Pakistani aerospace was closed for three months earlier this year. If this were to happen again, maybe the Indian government could hypothetically use Turkish pressure on Pakistan as a behind-the-scenes measure.

While you make logical arguments, the issue goes beyond trade and is now purely political. India is hyper sensitive to anything Pak or Kash related which is why even Rahul Batia’s lobbing may not carry the day. The moon or even the treetops are unrealistic is this environment unless we have seriously underestimated Bhatia’s influence.

Amritsar is the only new station that may work from a political standpoint and even this is highly dicey unless the minister can secure huge political, business, and Sikh-religious cover. Turkish and Indigo should help the minister in securing this cover rather than presenting him with an untenable position in this political environment. heck, even now Kash is a super hot potato.

Separately, IST must be working well for Indigo in terms of reservations which is why they probably want to get further in bed with Turkish. But, as Caliguy mentioned, they need to get additional fuel tanks for their planes.

edealinfo wrote:

While you make logical arguments, the issue goes beyond trade and is now purely political. India is hyper sensitive to anything Pak or Kash related which is why even Rahul Batia’s lobbing may not carry the day. The moon or even the treetops are unrealistic is this environment unless we have seriously underestimated Bhatia’s influence.

Amritsar is the only new station that may work from a political standpoint and even this is highly dicey unless the minister can secure huge cover.

I still say that 7 billion dollars cash annually will buy an awful lot of political forgiveness. Pragmatism rules the world in many ways. Even Pakistan, which cut off all trade relations with India after Kashmir 6 weeks ago, reopened pharmaceutical imports from India within 4 weeks after it realized that the only people being hurt by its embargo were its own citizens.

Speaking of which, 6E11 has taken 6h 51m to fly to IST today, which means we will soon hear stories about pax landing without their bags today too.

TEMPO wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

While you make logical arguments, the issue goes beyond trade and is now purely political. India is hyper sensitive to anything Pak or Kash related which is why even Rahul Batia’s lobbing may not carry the day. The moon or even the treetops are unrealistic is this environment unless we have seriously underestimated Bhatia’s influence.

Amritsar is the only new station that may work from a political standpoint and even this is highly dicey unless the minister can secure huge cover.

I still say that 7 billion dollars cash annually will buy an awful lot of political forgiveness. Pragmatism rules the world in many ways. Even Pakistan, which cut off all trade relations with India after Kashmir 6 weeks ago, reopened pharmaceutical imports from India within 4 weeks after it realized that the only people being hurt by its embargo were its own citizens.

I assume Rahul Bhatia presented your side of the argument to the Minister. Only time will tell whether this strategy works.

Don’t get me wrong. I fully understand and respect your views and think it may be a good economic choice for India. But, as I said earlier, in India, politics is a huge thing. You may recall that the Canadian Prime Minister was given the cold shoulder during his trip to India even though he went out of his way to try and please his hosts in India.They never forgave him for a largely political stance on supporting local Sikhs in Canada with somewhat an anti India attitude.

unrave wrote:

Speaking of which, 6E11 has taken 6h 51m to fly to IST today, which means we will soon hear stories about pax landing without their bags today too.

It doesn’t make sense. Are headwinds really that bad? Or, are they taking a longer route? has Pak forced them to take a less than optimal route when passing over Pak airspace?

edealinfo wrote:

unrave wrote:

Speaking of which, 6E11 has taken 6h 51m to fly to IST today, which means we will soon hear stories about pax landing without their bags today too.

It doesn’t make sense. Are headwinds really that bad? Or, are they taking a longer route? has Pak forced them to take a less than optimal route when passing over Pak airspace?

Headwinds. There is no issue with Pakistani airspace now.

Per CAPA, Vistara is to commence Delhi-Patna service in Oct-2019 or Nov-2019. Would Patna be a new station for them?

avier wrote:

vadodara wrote:

avier wrote:

CCU- RGN was announced a while back, and begins in a few days from now.

Likely logic will be additional services to SE Asia from other airports.

CCU/DEL remain safe bets for such launches. They can test the waters in that region from these two cities. They can even look towards the more affluent northeast asia, to places like South Korea/Taiwan/Japan on their A321Neo XLR's.

CCU is definitely a safe bet since is underserved c.w. DEL et al. Start out with CCU and see how things shake-up.

I think Taiwan, Japan, S. Korea will be logical bets. Their experience flying to Istanbul on 321's should come in handy.

TEMPO wrote:

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

In 2018, India’s exports to Turkey were USD 7 billion while Turkey’s exports to India were USD 750 million. In 2019, India’s number is supposed to go up to USD 8 billion while Turkey’s export figure would be about 1 billion. With the trade imbalance in India‘s favour to the tune of USD 7 billion, the Indian government would be foolish to choke off the export pipeline for the sake of a few landing slots. As a rhetoric comparison, Pakistan exported USD 300 million to Turkey and imported USD 600 million.

TK aimed at the moon with the hope of hitting at least the treetops. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised by TK getting 3 to 5 additional daily frequencies to India with caps on permitted seat numbers.

TK suffered right along with other airlines when Pakistani aerospace was closed for three months earlier this year. If this were to happen again, maybe the Indian government could hypothetically use Turkish pressure on Pakistan as a behind-the-scenes measure.

I suppose the restrictions on TK had more to do with the past largess' to likes of EK.

Considering what some liberal air slots have done with UAE and Saudi Arabia, i am more likely to believe that the govt. may throw some slots to TK. Ideally, they should open them to secondary airports. Abrupt shut-down of Pak airspace might now have another source of opposition.

unrave wrote:

Headwinds. There is no issue with Pakistani airspace now.

There may be more to the story than what meets the eye

Airlines play safe with A320Neo, lighten load


Aviation regulator DGCA hasn’t put out a directive in public yet about Airbus 320Neo, unlike its EU counterpart which issued an interim directive asking airlines to load the A320Neo in such a manner that the tail-end stays comparatively lighter. But to comply with the European regulator’s directive, airlines in India have begun to leave the cargo compartment closest to the tail empty, director general of civil aviation Arun Kumar told TOI on Tuesday.


https://www.google.com/amp/s/m.timesofi ... 176199.cms

British Airways to open a crew base in Hyderabad, India:

https://simpleflying.com/british-airways-india-crew/

vadodara wrote:

I suppose the restrictions on TK had more to do with the past largess' to likes of EK.

Considering what some liberal air slots have done with UAE and Saudi Arabia, i am more likely to believe that the govt. may throw some slots to TK. Ideally, they should open them to secondary airports. Abrupt shut-down of Pak airspace might now have another source of opposition.

This is from just a few days ago
"The Narendra Modi government is set to continue in its second term the policy of NOT increasing foreign flying rights with countries in West Asia and Southeast Asia, as their allocation has been controversial in the past and was flagged by Indian audit and investigation agencies"

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/in ... 092599.cms

TEMPO wrote:

CaliguyNYC wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Simple. They support Pakistan’s position over India’s as it relates to Kash, and then they ask for like 10 additional daily frequencies . They just don’t know how to play this politically even though the writing is on the wall. Their best chance is to have asked for an additional frequency to Amritsar alone which is the aviation minister’s constituency and obtained local business and religious support for the flight which would give the minister enough political cover to provide the right to that 1x daily flight without stirring a hornet’s nest. But, the dummies, instead, ask for the moon. too bad they don’t have formal courses on effective lobbying in India.

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.)

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

In 2018, India’s exports to Turkey were USD 7 billion while Turkey’s exports to India were USD 750 million. In 2019, India’s number is supposed to go up to USD 8 billion while Turkey’s export figure would be about 1 billion. With the trade imbalance in India‘s favour to the tune of USD 7 billion, the Indian government would be foolish to choke off the export pipeline for the sake of a few landing slots. As a rhetoric comparison, Pakistan exported USD 300 million to Turkey and imported USD 600 million.

TK aimed at the moon with the hope of hitting at least the treetops. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised by TK getting 3 to 5 additional daily frequencies to India with caps on permitted seat numbers.

TK suffered right along with other airlines when Pakistani aerospace was closed for three months earlier this year. If this were to happen again, maybe the Indian government could hypothetically use Turkish pressure on Pakistan as a behind-the-scenes measure.

India hasn't increased bilaterals with UAE/Dubai/Singapore which are even bigger trading partners compared to Turkey. UAE/Dubai also were pro-India in the recent issues with Pakistan. Even then, India hasn't increased bilaterals even though they are close to exhaustion. So there is no reason to believe Turkey will get anything more given their rabid anti-India stand. There needs to be a clear quid pro quo. Anything is possible in politics, so India won't hand over the bilaterals on the platter, but will extract some concession out of it if it comes to that. My personal belief is that Turkey will probably be at end of the queue after likes of Dubai/UAE, Singapore etc

Mumbai airport now has more domestic seats on offer than it did when Jet Airways was flying

Remember the capacity crunch in Mumbai after the grounding of Jet Airways? Turns out that the Mumbai airport now has more seats on offer on domestic routes than it had when Jet operated its complete schedule. This is despite the fact that the airport has not given away all the slots of Jet Airways – be it domestic or international.

There is no surprise then that last week, the government held talks with airlines on sustainability. Airline pricing is a function of capacity in the market and demand. And while there were fears of higher fares immediately post suspension of Jet Airways in April, the government-led mechanism with airports to give away slots for temporary period has not only matched the gap, but now exceeded the seats deployed. By June, the difference was down to only 11 departures a day and while there continues to be a slight lag in departures now versus when Jet Airways operated, the interesting turn of events have led to higher seats in the market.

How did this happen?

The slots of Jet Airways were divided amongst incumbent airlines. However, the slots were linked to induction of capacity and airlines weren’t allowed to pull out of existing sectors and deploy the capacity to these newly acquired slots at Mumbai. In a scramble to add capacity, SpiceJet became the biggest beneficiary of the slots as it inducted aircraft which earlier flew for Jet Airways and also recruited B737 pilots. While the pilots and crew were absorbed across airlines, the A320 operators will take time to operationalise the pilots and crew as they undergo type rating and training. Vistara followed SpiceJet in inducting the B737s and adding capacity at Mumbai.

More on the link

Would anyone happen to know when the regulator will extend Jet's domestic slots allotment to airlines? They are currently until December 31st 2019, and am sure the airlines would like a definite answer (just like me ) so that they can set up the rest of their W19 schedules...

CollegeAviator wrote:

Would anyone happen to know when the regulator will extend Jet's domestic slots allotment to airlines? They are currently until December 31st 2019, and am sure the airlines would like a definite answer (just like me ) so that they can set up the rest of their W19 schedules...

There were some rumours about the slots/rights being extended till the end of WS

IndiGo's newest destination: Shirdi.
Will connect the temple town with Bengaluru, Hyderabad(x2 daily) & Indore from Oct 27th, with ATR 72's.

TEMPO wrote:

CaliguyNYC wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Simple. They support Pakistan’s position over India’s as it relates to Kash, and then they ask for like 10 additional daily frequencies . They just don’t know how to play this politically even though the writing is on the wall. Their best chance is to have asked for an additional frequency to Amritsar alone which is the aviation minister’s constituency and obtained local business and religious support for the flight which would give the minister enough political cover to provide the right to that 1x daily flight without stirring a hornet’s nest. But, the dummies, instead, ask for the moon. too bad they don’t have formal courses on effective lobbying in India.

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.)

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

In 2018, India’s exports to Turkey were USD 7 billion while Turkey’s exports to India were USD 750 million. In 2019, India’s number is supposed to go up to USD 8 billion while Turkey’s export figure would be about 1 billion. With the trade imbalance in India‘s favour to the tune of USD 7 billion, the Indian government would be foolish to choke off the export pipeline for the sake of a few landing slots. As a rhetoric comparison, Pakistan exported USD 300 million to Turkey and imported USD 600 million.

TK aimed at the moon with the hope of hitting at least the treetops. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised by TK getting 3 to 5 additional daily frequencies to India with caps on permitted seat numbers.

TK suffered right along with other airlines when Pakistani aerospace was closed for three months earlier this year. If this were to happen again, maybe the Indian government could hypothetically use Turkish pressure on Pakistan as a behind-the-scenes measure.

Trade will continue but aviation bilaterals, for what ever reason, much more politics involved. Turkey is subject to the fact that India has limited many allies seats (like UAE and Singapore). Plus there is very little O&D between the two countries. Add to this Turkey’s crazily anti India stance, and no sir aviation will not trump this. Btw to call what turkey did Rhetoric, totally diminishes the damage Turkey is trying to inflict on india. Dignity can live alongside trade in a modern freesia trade environment. Indigo should find another aviation partner.

Excellent story of slot allocation and availability

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbctv ... 81.htm/amp

Vistara— Go after the Chennai slots!

CaliguyNYC wrote:

TEMPO wrote:

CaliguyNYC wrote:

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.)

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

In 2018, India’s exports to Turkey were USD 7 billion while Turkey’s exports to India were USD 750 million. In 2019, India’s number is supposed to go up to USD 8 billion while Turkey’s export figure would be about 1 billion. With the trade imbalance in India‘s favour to the tune of USD 7 billion, the Indian government would be foolish to choke off the export pipeline for the sake of a few landing slots. As a rhetoric comparison, Pakistan exported USD 300 million to Turkey and imported USD 600 million.

TK aimed at the moon with the hope of hitting at least the treetops. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised by TK getting 3 to 5 additional daily frequencies to India with caps on permitted seat numbers.

TK suffered right along with other airlines when Pakistani aerospace was closed for three months earlier this year. If this were to happen again, maybe the Indian government could hypothetically use Turkish pressure on Pakistan as a behind-the-scenes measure.

Trade will continue but aviation bilaterals, for what ever reason, much more politics involved. Turkey is subject to the fact that India has limited many allies seats (like UAE and Singapore). Plus there is very little O&D between the two countries. Add to this Turkey’s crazily anti India stance, and no sir aviation will not trump this. Btw to call what turkey did Rhetoric, totally diminishes the damage Turkey is trying to inflict on india. Dignity can live alongside trade in a modern freesia trade environment. Indigo should find another aviation partner.

What exactly did Turkey say against India on the Pak issue? Did they call for Kash. peoples right to self determination, which is the same as democracy? Is this why you said it is affecting India’s dignity?

edealinfo wrote:

Per CAPA, Vistara is to commence Delhi-Patna service in Oct-2019 or Nov-2019. Would Patna be a new station for them?

Per the PAT Wikipedia page, it starts October 27. I can't find anything other than the CAPA report to corroborate this other than this link from Dainik Bhaskar (in Hindi) which claims it will double daily:

https://www.bhaskar.com/bihar/patna/new ... 77659.html

Translation of the gist:
Vistara Airlines will start two flights Delhi-Patna-Delhi from October 27. The first flight will land at Patna Airport at 8:20 am and takeoff for Delhi at 8:50 am. The second flight will land at Patna Airport at 7:50 pm and takeoff at 8:20 pm. Here, Flight AI 415/416 going to Delhi in the evening of Air India which was canceled for almost a month, will start from 16 September. With this, the number of aircraft operating from Patna Airport will be 49. There will be 24 aircraft for Delhi.

Probably ignorance on my part but TBH I am a bit surprised that PAT has premium demand for 2 x daily. I would have expected BOM/DEL-JAI or BOM/DEL-STV (and no I am not a part of WWWAS before anyone asks so no trolling please! ) before PAT. JAI should complete the Rajasthan tourist circuit trifecta with UDR and JDH.

Publications on both sides of the India-Pakistan border are reporting that Pakistani airspace is closed to Indian and India-bound craft.

From LiveMint:
“Indian carriers usually use Pakistani airspace on all their West-bound flights, but this time special permission has been sought [for PM Modi’s US-bound aircraft] since Pakistan closed its air space amid tensions after India revoked Article 370 of its Constitution.”

https://www.livemint.com/news/india/pak ... 15237.html

This is completely false since, as I write this, both Turkish and Indigo are flying through Pakistani airspace from Istanbul to Delhi along with dozens of other flights transiting through Lahore and Amritsar airspace to other destinations. On the other hand, VIP aircraft for both the Indian PM And the President have been denied overflight rights, but that’s it!

Why is this falsehood still making the rounds in so many Indian and Pakistani publications? No one cares for the truth any more in either country?

VTORD wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Per CAPA, Vistara is to commence Delhi-Patna service in Oct-2019 or Nov-2019. Would Patna be a new station for them?

Per the PAT Wikipedia page, it starts October 27. I can't find anything other than the CAPA report to corroborate this other than this link from Dainik Bhaskar (in Hindi) which claims it will double daily:

https://www.bhaskar.com/bihar/patna/new ... 77659.html

Translation of the gist:
Vistara Airlines will start two flights Delhi-Patna-Delhi from October 27. The first flight will land at Patna Airport at 8:20 am and takeoff for Delhi at 8:50 am. The second flight will land at Patna Airport at 7:50 pm and takeoff at 8:20 pm. Here, Flight AI 415/416 going to Delhi in the evening of Air India which was canceled for almost a month, will start from 16 September. With this, the number of aircraft operating from Patna Airport will be 49. There will be 24 aircraft for Delhi.

Probably ignorance on my part but TBH I am a bit surprised that PAT has premium demand for 2 x daily. I would have expected BOM/DEL-JAI or BOM/DEL-STV (and no I am not a part of WWWAS before anyone asks so no trolling please! ) before PAT. JAI should complete the Rajasthan tourist circuit trifecta with UDR and JDH.

Thanks for all the additional info. I assume the double daily perfectly caters to the rich folk who do day trips between DEL and Patna (and yeah, I had no idea there were that many).

Vistara already operates to Jaipur but I agree that Surat would be a good addition. surely all those diamond traders must be loaded.

Nevertheless, I Think they should focus on Chennai. It is a Level 3 slot restricted airport ( and a new airport will realistically be a decade away). They should grab those MAA slots while they are available. In a year, MAA slots will be as hard to come by as BOM slots so they better get their act together...... before Indigo, but more so SpiceJet also reach the same conclusion.

CaliguyNYC wrote:

TEMPO wrote:

CaliguyNYC wrote:

I know business is business but is Indigo living with their head in the sand. Have they not seen what is going on in the country right now and the stance that Turkey took (and seriously turkey took a stronger stance against indian then even China). Find another partner Indigo. Btw even if Turkey hadn’t taken that stance, increasing the bilateral so that Indigo can run narrow bodies between India and TK while TK runs 777 is just plane dumb. The fact that Indigo’s planes cant even make the trip with all the luggage when there are winds shows their strategy won’t work int he long term. Say 20 people’s bags are left every flight, that is a lot of angry pax, Who would take that flight.)

I’ve said this before but at the risk of belabouring the point, I’ll say it again. In the 21st-century, trade trumps rhetoric. Witness the India-China trade and rhetoric relationship - USD 100 billion annually, and growing.

In 2018, India’s exports to Turkey were USD 7 billion while Turkey’s exports to India were USD 750 million. In 2019, India’s number is supposed to go up to USD 8 billion while Turkey’s export figure would be about 1 billion. With the trade imbalance in India‘s favour to the tune of USD 7 billion, the Indian government would be foolish to choke off the export pipeline for the sake of a few landing slots. As a rhetoric comparison, Pakistan exported USD 300 million to Turkey and imported USD 600 million.

TK aimed at the moon with the hope of hitting at least the treetops. As I said in a previous post, I would not be surprised by TK getting 3 to 5 additional daily frequencies to India with caps on permitted seat numbers.

TK suffered right along with other airlines when Pakistani aerospace was closed for three months earlier this year. If this were to happen again, maybe the Indian government could hypothetically use Turkish pressure on Pakistan as a behind-the-scenes measure.

Trade will continue but aviation bilaterals, for what ever reason, much more politics involved. Turkey is subject to the fact that India has limited many allies seats (like UAE and Singapore). Plus there is very little O&D between the two countries. Add to this Turkey’s crazily anti India stance, and no sir aviation will not trump this. Btw to call what turkey did Rhetoric, totally diminishes the damage Turkey is trying to inflict on india. Dignity can live alongside trade in a modern freesia trade environment. Indigo should find another aviation partner.

What I don’t get is why Indigo rebuffed Qatar in favor of Turkey. indigo already has numerous flights to Doha and a partnership with Qatar (for economy class only) would seem like a more natural fit for them.

Separately, in the past, Turkish had tried to use a code share partnership with Air India to secure additional bilaterals and their CEO accompanied the AI Chairman in meeting the then Civil Aviation Minister but those attempts failed. I assume they think Bhatia/Indigo has more influence.

Government to sell Air India with a debt of just 15,000 crore . This seems to be a logical move if they hope to find a buyer

https://www.google.com/amp/s/m.economic ... 176962.cms

The government is likely to consider selling Air India in such a way that the acquirer does not have to take on its working capital debt, thus halving the burden and making it a more attractive prospect, said people with knowledge of the matter.
The carrier, which the government is again trying to sell after having failed in 2018, will then be left with just Rs 15,000 crore of debt, for loans taken to buy planes.

Virgin Atlantic to start Bangalore and Calcutta flights if it gets additional slots when Heathrow builds 3rd runway..

Check out the map in the link

https://simpleflying.com/virgin-atlanti ... expansion/

Air Asia to introduce flights from Tripura

https://www.cnbctv18.com/aviation/air-a ... 371601.htm

https://www.livemint.com/companies/news ... 01721.html

Government open to sell part of Air India to foreign airline
The government will also likely invite preliminary bids for the carrier by 10 October
The government has moved about 300 billion rupees ($4.21 billion) of Air India's debt to a separate holding company

Bengaluru, Hyderabad feature among world's fastest growing airports in 15 million category

https://www.livemint.com/news/india/ben ... 08712.html

The Airport Council International (ACI) has released its latest report on the fastest growing airports in the world for 2018 in which two of India's airport finds a place. The Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru is on the first position with a growth of 29.1% passenger traffic while Hyderabad's Rajiv Gandhi International Airport was on the third place with a growth of 21.9% in passenger traffic.

The Antlya Airport in Turkey is in the second position. The total number of passengers in the Bengaluru airport was 32,331,783 while Hyderabad Airport had a passenger footfall of 20,903,930

https://www.livemint.com/companies/news ... 61048.html

Bhubaneswar airport to remain partially shut for 8 months

The runway re-carpeting will be done in two phases from November
The re-carpeting of the runway is a regular maintenance work and was last taken up at the Biju Patnaik International Airport in 2007

IndiGo to add 4th station in Karnataka, with daily flights between Mysore and Hyderabad (starting 27th October).

VTORD wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Per CAPA, Vistara is to commence Delhi-Patna service in Oct-2019 or Nov-2019. Would Patna be a new station for them?

Per the PAT Wikipedia page, it starts October 27. I can't find anything other than the CAPA report to corroborate this other than this link from Dainik Bhaskar (in Hindi) which claims it will double daily:

https://www.bhaskar.com/bihar/patna/new ... 77659.html

Translation of the gist:
Vistara Airlines will start two flights Delhi-Patna-Delhi from October 27. The first flight will land at Patna Airport at 8:20 am and takeoff for Delhi at 8:50 am. The second flight will land at Patna Airport at 7:50 pm and takeoff at 8:20 pm. Here, Flight AI 415/416 going to Delhi in the evening of Air India which was canceled for almost a month, will start from 16 September. With this, the number of aircraft operating from Patna Airport will be 49. There will be 24 aircraft for Delhi.

Probably ignorance on my part but TBH I am a bit surprised that PAT has premium demand for 2 x daily. I would have expected BOM/DEL-JAI or BOM/DEL-STV (and no I am not a part of WWWAS before anyone asks so no trolling please! ) before PAT. JAI should complete the Rajasthan tourist circuit trifecta with UDR and JDH.

On the contrary I am surprised it took them this long to open PAT. The only thing hampering growth there is the small airport. There is no dearth of premium traffic, especially to Delhi with all the political and business movement. There is a reason 24 daily flights to DEL exist.

Regards
Unnayan

unnayan wrote:

VTORD wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

Per CAPA, Vistara is to commence Delhi-Patna service in Oct-2019 or Nov-2019. Would Patna be a new station for them?

Per the PAT Wikipedia page, it starts October 27. I can't find anything other than the CAPA report to corroborate this other than this link from Dainik Bhaskar (in Hindi) which claims it will double daily:

https://www.bhaskar.com/bihar/patna/new ... 77659.html

Translation of the gist:
Vistara Airlines will start two flights Delhi-Patna-Delhi from October 27. The first flight will land at Patna Airport at 8:20 am and takeoff for Delhi at 8:50 am. The second flight will land at Patna Airport at 7:50 pm and takeoff at 8:20 pm. Here, Flight AI 415/416 going to Delhi in the evening of Air India which was canceled for almost a month, will start from 16 September. With this, the number of aircraft operating from Patna Airport will be 49. There will be 24 aircraft for Delhi.

Probably ignorance on my part but TBH I am a bit surprised that PAT has premium demand for 2 x daily. I would have expected BOM/DEL-JAI or BOM/DEL-STV (and no I am not a part of WWWAS before anyone asks so no trolling please! ) before PAT. JAI should complete the Rajasthan tourist circuit trifecta with UDR and JDH.

On the contrary I am surprised it took them this long to open PAT. The only thing hampering growth there is the small airport. There is no dearth of premium traffic, especially to Delhi with all the political and business movement. There is a reason 24 daily flights to DEL exist.

Regards
Unnayan

Patna at least needs a new terminal. The one in use is so old and looks dilapidated.

Are there any airports in India that can handle the A320 but not the A321?

unrave wrote:

Are there any airports in India that can handle the A320 but not the A321?

Quite a few. Use about ~8000ft as the reference for requirement for the A321 and just look up airports and their runway lengths. Also elevation needs to be considered. If elevation is higher, runway req increases. So Leh for eg. would find it hard to accomodate an A321 despite having a fairly longish runway.
Other factors also come into play like payload/engine max thrust rating etc, but just use the above for rough reference.
Ones that come to mind are Dehradun/Jammu/Patna/Rajkot. But I'm sure there are many more.

^Also assuming this question was asked in reference to runway requirements , as gate space/terminal capacity is a whole different thing again.

unnayan wrote:

VTORD wrote:

edealinfo wrote:

There is no dearth of premium traffic, especially to Delhi with all the political and business movement. There is a reason 24 daily flights to DEL exist.

Regards
Unnayan

Excellent perspective. Thanks.

Air passenger traffic falls for 3rd straight month

https://www.livemint.com/news/india/air ... 55952.html

Nashik Inc. asks PM to give the city wings


https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cit ... 191301.cms

IndiGo has continued its dominance of the Indian airspace, cornering 47 percent of the market share in the country.

(I think the regulators should step in and mandate that no carrier should have more than 1/3, or 33.33%, of slots in any of the Level 3 and Level 2 slot restricted/constrained airports. However, I doubt they have the kahunas to do this so instead, as an immediate remedy, I suggest that no new domestic slots in Level 3 airports be allotted to any carrier with a nationwide domestic market share exceeding 33.33%. This would keep Indigo from getting any new slots in DEL, BOM, MAA and CCU . In addition, those with a nationwide market share exceeding 33.33% shouldn't be allowed to get 7 am to 7 pm slots in Level- 2 constrained airports.

SpiceJet managed the highest passenger load factor — a metric that measures capacity utilisation — with 92.4 percent. AirAsia (87.8 percent), GoAir (87.5 percent), IndiGo (84.3 percent), and Vistara (81.8 percent) rounded up the top five.

(Good job AirAsia India and Go Air -- very impressive)

https://www.cnbctv18.com/aviation/indig ... 379401.htm

Bhadra wrote:

IndiGo to add 4th station in Karnataka, with daily flights between Mysore and Hyderabad (starting 27th October).

Nice route. They should also try Goa to Mysore for a better tourist circuit route or Mysore to Jaipur although I am unclear if an ATR has the legs for the latter route.

blrsea wrote:

India hasn't increased bilaterals with UAE/Dubai/Singapore which are even bigger trading partners compared to Turkey. UAE/Dubai also were pro-India in the recent issues with Pakistan. Even then, India hasn't increased bilaterals even though they are close to exhaustion. So there is no reason to believe Turkey will get anything more given their rabid anti-India stand. There needs to be a clear quid pro quo. Anything is possible in politics, so India won't hand over the bilaterals on the platter, but will extract some concession out of it if it comes to that. My personal belief is that Turkey will probably be at end of the queue after likes of Dubai/UAE, Singapore etc

1. What was Turkey's "rabid anti-India" stand, specifically? I mean what did they say? Or, what did they they say that you didn't expect them to say?

2. "UAE/Dubai also were pro-India in the recent issues with Pakistan." I totally didn't expect this so hats off to the PM for pulling this diplomatic coup. Also hats off to him for getting Saudi to allow overflights to Israel. Both are very significant diplomatic successes.

3. How did Iran react and how was it different from that of Turkey? And, what about Qatar? If any of them kept silent, in my opinion, that would be the best India could have asked for diplomatically.

All A320 Neo operators in compliance with weight balance directives, says DGCA
At present Indigo, Goair, Air India and Vistara operate the Neo-engine powered A320 planes

What is the opportunity cost to airlines of this directive? In other words, how much does an airline stand to lose as a result of this directive? Is it a realistically zero effect or something more?

https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/busin ... 52251.html

edealinfo wrote:

All A320 Neo operators in compliance with weight balance directives, says DGCA
At present Indigo, Goair, Air India and Vistara operate the Neo-engine powered A320 planes

What is the opportunity cost to airlines of this directive? In other words, how much does an airline stand to lose as a result of this directive? Is it a realistically zero effect or something more?

https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/busin ... 52251.html

Please continue further detailed discussions on this subject here:

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1427225