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India to revise air traffic pact with Egypt

First such revision in BJP government

Aneesh Phadnis Mumbai:
India will revise air traffic rights with Egypt, the first such agreement after BJP-led NDA government came to power in May. The move will benefit Egypt Air to expand services to India. Currently it operates four weekly flights to Mumbai and is keen to launch flights between Cairo-Delhi in winter schedule. At present passengers also opt for a one stop flights via Gulf.

No Indian carrier flies to Egypt at present but Air India is exploring code shares with Egypt Air, a Star Alliance member, on routes in Africa. Egypt Air has a code share with Air India on Delhi-Mumbai route.

 

In April last year, India had increased bilateral entitlements to Abu Dhabi from 13,300 seats a week to 50,000 a week. The same day, Etihad announced it was picking up a 24% stake in Abu Dhabi-based Jet Airways. This led to a controversy and litigation with BJP leader Subramanian Swamy challenging government decision in Supreme Court.

In February the government revised traffic rights with Dubai increasing the entitlement by 11,000 weekly seats over existing 54,200 seats.

Other countries including Qatar, Turkey, Malaysia and Kenya have been pitching for an increase in traffic rights but the government has been on a go slow mode on these requests due to controversies surrounding the Abu Dhabi deal. The civil aviation ministry is also

An another reason is that Indian carriers have not shown much interest in expanding or launching flights to these countries and any increase in seat allocation would only be seen as benefitting the foreign airlines.

Qatar which has 24,800 seats to India has virtually utilised all the entitlement had sought an extra 48,000 seats per week. Indian carriers are barely utilising a fourth of approved entitlement. Qatar offered concessions in supply of liquified natural gas in lieu of additional seats but Indian government turned down the demand.

According to Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation foreign airlines will require an extra 1.7 lakh seats from India in the near term. Turkish Airlines which flies to Mumbai and Delhi is keen to add other routes while Kenya Airways to wants to increase frequency between Nairobi-Delhi and launch new sectors in India.

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First Published: Aug 20 2014 | 5:18 PM IST

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