Air Deccan is set to re-launch operations with its first flight under the government's Ude Desh Ka Aam Nagrik (UDAN) scheme on December 23.
Watch the accompanying video of CNBC-TV18's Ashpreet Sethi for more details.
According to a Mint report, India’s first domestic budget airline will kick off operations with its famous Re 1 ticket fare on 22 December with its first flight from Mumbai to Nashik. Air Deccan will initially operate from four key cities — Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Shillong and connect its passengers to smaller cities.
Gopinath was quoted by the report to state that the famous Re 1 fare will be given to a few lucky passengers, though most tickets will be priced at Rs1,400 for a 40-minute flight from Mumbai to Nashik.
The company was founded in 2003 by G.R. Gopinath and merged with Kingfisher Airlines in 2008 and rebranded to Kingfisher Red. The company’s operations were stopped due to financial difficulties in 2012.
The Udan scheme aims to connect small towns with fares as low as Rs2,500 for a one-hour flight.Air Deccan will also operate daily return flights between Nashik and Pune and Mumbai and Jalgaon.
The company plans to connect to Delhi with another aircraft by January. Flights from the capital will move to Agra, Shimla, Ludhiana, Pantnagar, Dehradun and Kullu.
Air Deccan will have two planes in Kolkata, to Jamshedpur, Rourkela, Durgapur, Bagdogra, Burnpur, Cooch Behar, Agartala, and from Shillong to Imphal, Dimapur, Aizawl and Agartala.
Gopinath stated that his plans for expansion were being slowed down by the airport authorities not providing slots for his smaller planes. As these planes do not need to pay a fee, they do not provide profits to these airports. It was only after several requests were made to the aviation ministry that he got the necessary slots.
The Delhi airport stated that Air Deccan was offered 10 slots, which include 4-midnight slots. There are a total of 26 slots reserved for the UDAN initiative, and that Air Deccan is yet to finalize their schedule.
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