In the recent development of events, the winter schedule was released for the aviation industry, which came into effect from October 31st, 2021. The approval of 108 airports was cleared by the regulators. The winter schedule sees a dip of 4.38% as compared to the previous schedule of 2019, with SpiceJet contributing with the maximum reduction of 30%. The country currently has over 100 operational airports, 27 of which have only one airline operator. Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Mumbai have nine active airline operators.
The New Schedules for the Airlines
Indigo, which owns the majority of the domestic market and is the largest airline in India in terms of fleet, will operate to 71 destinations. The addition of ATR 72-600 carriers has strengthened the airline’s position in increasing the number of working stations in the country. Since the previous schedule, Indigo has launched various flights to cities such as Gwalior and Bareilly and even returned to the city of Jabalpur.
After the sale of Air India, Alliance Air remains the only government-owned airline in the country and will now operate in 59 cities of the country. Currently, Alliance Air has only 18 ATR 72-600 carriers under its wings which is a point of concern for the profit aspect of the venture. The Delhi-Shimla route which was the first RCS-UDAN route has been discontinued as well. However, the airline expects the addition of Do-228 aircraft to operate in the northeast.
The Tata Group, who is emerging as the toughest competitor in the domestic market after the acquisition of AIR India has received the approval of 54 cities for Air India. Previously they had 56 cities but have now opted out of Khajuraho due to lack of tourism and Thoise, which used to be a military charter.
Vistara which has the majority interests of Tata Group airlines will operate in 29 cities and will return to the city of Jodhpur. They are also relaunching flights to Dehradun. On the other hand, Air Asia India will operate in 18 cities in this schedule which might be the last of it as it may see a merger or name change in the next.
Last but not least SpiceJet has opted for a rather different strategy. The airline has shrunk the most in terms of weekly flights. But this could be a smart move by the carrier as instead of vacating a station they have reduced their presence. They have also launched flights to cities like Jaipur, Jodhpur, and Udaipur which have high tourist attractions in the winter and will vacate the cities during the summer schedule.
