IA to introduce 37 flights to Gulf

Move to cope with summer rush

Indian Airlines (IA) "" the national carrier that services the Gulf sector besides domestic routes "" is introducing 37 additional flights on the India-Gulf route during June and July to cope with the summer rush. These flights will generate around 6,365 additional seats for this route.

The Hyderabad-Sharjah and Kochi-Doha routes will have 12 and two additional flights, respectively, in June-July. While the airline will operate one additional flight on the Kozhikode-Doha route, there will be six additional flights on the Thiruvananthapuram-Sharjah as well as on the Hyderabad-Dubai sector. Five additional flights are being added on the Kochi-Sharjah route besides five on Kozhikode-Goa-Sharjah sector.

Confirming the development, senior executives at IA told Business Standard: "The decision is based on the growing demand on this sector during the peak summer season. There is not only a big rush to the Gulf region from India, but the traffic inflow into India from the Middle-East is also equally heavy. This is growing further."

While the 145-seater A320s would be deployed on 27 new frequencies, the 245-seater A300s would operate on 10 of these additional services to the Gulf region, sources said.

IA operates daily scheduled flights on these routes except on the Thiruvananthapuram-Sharjah sector, on which it operates four flights a week. Last week, the airline had announced nine additional flights on the Mumbai-Muscat sector spread over May, June and July.

IA has a fleet of 41 A320s of which 31 are company-owned aircraft while the rest are on lease. The carrier's fleet also has 4 A300s.