Is there room for a regional airline?<\/span> \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcThe role model for the new Air India is the Air India of old’<\/span> Spicy aspirations<\/span><\/span> Bhopal needs world class airport: Increase in connectivity <\/span><\/span> Man and machine<\/span> Taking India Aloft<\/span><\/span> AI: Hot air or taking wings?<\/span><\/span> Give India a flying start<\/span>
V. Jayanth
The Hindu
Aug 20, 2007<\/a>
I<\/span>n yet another policy formulation, the Union Civil Aviation Minister, Praful Patel, has announced the creation of a new category of scheduled operations \u00e2\u20ac\u201d Regional airlines. This will apply to both fixed wing and helicopter operators, and will be confined to services within a region, dividing the country into four regions \u00e2\u20ac\u201d north, south, west, and east\/ northeast.
This announcement has met with a mixed response from both airline circles and aviation industry sources. But there appears to be a general consensus that this classification could have waited for the process of acquisitions, mergers, and consolidation to take place in the airline industry. Civil Aviation officials, however, insist that it was unveiled only to enable the various airlines to draw up their roadmaps for future growth and development.
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Indian Express
August 19, 2007 <\/a>
V. Thulasidas<\/span>, CMD of Air India after Indian Airlines was merged with it, began his career as a lecturer in English. He was then selected to the IAS in the Manipur-Tripura cadre and has worked in various capacities in Kerala, Tripura and the Centre. He headed Air India even before the merger, and is credited with giving the airline a new direction with his leadership. In a freewheeling discussion with Express staff, moderated by Financial Express Dy Executive Editor Sourav Majumdar<\/span>, at Express Towers, Mumbai, Thulasidas spoke about the challenges facing the new airline in highly competitive times.
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Raja Awasthi
Economic Times
Aug 19, 2007<\/a>
At a time when the domestic aviation industry is struggling to steer clear of loss zones, Spice Jet has registered profits in the first quarter. The company is now aspiring to attain a breakeven in the current fiscal. The low cost carrier (LCC) SpiceJet, with a fleet size of 14 planes and market share of more than 8%, is the second largest LCC carrier in India.
The airlines will be increasing its fleet from 14 aircraft to 26 by 2008-end. Siddhanta Sharma, chairman & CEO, Spice Jet, in exclusive interview, speaks about the civil aviation sector and his group\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s future plans.
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Central Chronicle
August 17, 2007<\/a>
With connectivity increasing at global level the need for developing airports of international standards in Madhya Pradesh could be understood. Recently Chairman-cum-Managing Director of Indian Dr Vishwapati Trivedi talked about the lack of facilities for aircraft parking. According to him, stations like Ahmedabad and Baroda have become full. He advised that there is need to build aircraft parking in Bhopal. Airports at Indore, Bhopal, Gwalior and Jabalpur are comparatively small in the state.
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Abhijit Bhattacharyya
The Telegraph
August 15, 2007<\/a>
Although much has been said about the length of runways and the slippery surface caused by rain, what remains unsaid is that even at the best of times and with the best of technology at hand what matters most in any critical stage of the flight is the capability of the man behind the machine. Flying is a job in which even the slightest of mistakes can result in fatalities. This is borne out by numerous air disasters around the world.
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Ruth David
Forbes, US
August 13, 2007<\/a>
Bangalore: Gorur Ramaswamy Gopinath, the founder of India’s largest low-cost airline, Air Deccan, is glad he didn’t do any market research when he started operations in August 2003 in a country where less than 1% of the population traveled by air.
Gopinath, a retired captain in the Indian army, says the typical reaction when he went to raise money was that India was not ready for a low-cost airline, because of a tightly controlled market, poor infrastructure at airports and the lack of sheer numbers needed to make operations profitable. But Air Deccan–started with an investment of $10 million–was aimed at getting the millions who traveled by trains and buses to switch to aircraft.
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Virgin set to enter Indian territory, mobile first<\/span><\/span>
George Koshy
CNN-IBN
August 12, 2007<\/a>
Malaysia: The aviation industry is heating up to more competition. British business mogul Richard Branson\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Virgin Aviation has recently announced its entry into the Asian aviation space with a 20 per cent stake in Air Asia.
From low cost travel to Virgin mobiles, Branson, the billionaire behind the multi-platform Virgin brand, said that he looks at India as a potential market and soon he is going to increase his presence for Indian customers.
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The heat is on: It’s rock and roll in the skies<\/span>
Shobha John
Times of India
Aug 12, 2007<\/a>
It could well be a harbinger of things to come. Increasing storms, violent thunderclaps, greater wind speeds \u00e2\u20ac\u201d the din unleashed in the heavens by the weather gods between April and September (pre-monsoons to end of season) over the last two-three years has surprised and alarmed even veteran aviators. And as they struggle to steady their big metallic birds and stay calm lest it unnerve their passengers, the niggling question on their minds is: Are these severe climatic changes a sign of global warming?
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Chidanand Rajghatta
Times of India
Aug 5, 2007<\/a>
The storied history of aviation in India added a new chapter last week when Captain Amitabh Singh took off from Boeing Field near Seattle in a spanking new 777-LR and headed to New Delhi. Thanks to oversimplification of the globe, we tend to think the distance from the United States east coast to India should be shorter than from the west coast. But as the unofficial flight demonstrated \u00e2\u20ac\u201d by taking the Arctic route \u00e2\u20ac\u201d what you see isn’t what you get.
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Nirbhay Kumar
Economic Times
August 02, 2007<\/a>
Sustained buoyancy in India\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s aviation sector has been appreciated globally, but experts have not failed to notice that lack of adequate infrastructure could be a roadblock. That explains civil aviation minister Praful Patel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s emphasis on building the country\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s airport infrastructure to lay the foundation for long-term growth in both passenger as well as cargo traffic.
With an open investment regime and liberal policy on bilaterals, the civil aviation minister wants to take aviation to the masses. Among the plans in the pipeline are building airports within 50 km of every significantly large habitat in the country.
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What is the Truth Behind the Latest Twists in the Air India Flight 182 Case?<\/span><\/span>
Avtar Singh
Panthic Weekly
August 01, 2007<\/a>
Last week an article appeared in the magazine Tehelka, written by Vikram Jit Singh, referring to a secret recording of the interrogation of Shaheed Bhai Talwinder Singh Parmar between 9 -14 October 1992. The recording was supposedly made by retired Punjab Police DSP Harmail Singh Chandi, who has for some strange reason decided 15 years later to now make known the contents of his secret recordings that senior police officers had asked to be destroyed.
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