After a lull, international carriers have renewed their interest in the Indian market and are launching flights, adding new destinations and increasing frequencies from some destinations.
The airlines, who have added or plan to add new destinations in India, are Richard Branson-promoted Virgin Atlantic and Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific.
Virgin Atlantic in October added Mumbai as a new destination. The airline restarted operations apart from New Delhi.
Cathay Pacific has announced Hyderabad as its new destination from December. The airline operates from Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai, and its wholly-owned subsidiary Dragonair flies to Kolkata and Bangalore. The new airline on the block is Maldivian Airline that has announced flights connecting Mumbai and Chennai to Male.
Existing player Air Asia has plans to increase frequencies from a large number of destinations they currently operate from. The airline is planning to increase its flights from Delhi, Kochi, Tiruchirappalli and Chennai as per a report in Indian Express.
This renewed interest in India has come after a lot of international airline companies have said that they will have discontinue flights from the country due to very high airport charges.
The trigger for the resistance from airlines was a 346 per cent increase in landing and parking charges at the Delhi airport by Airports Economic Regulatory Authority of India and Mumbai airport also asking for same amount of increase. The mood has changed now and various airline operators are looking at the Indian market.
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