Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman with MoS Pankaj Chaudhary and Budget team during giving final touches to the Union Budget, in New Delhi, on July 22, 2024.
| Photo Credit: PTI

Indian airlines need to be strengthened in order to ensure long-haul international air connectivity, the Economic Survey 2024 said.

The emphasis on supporting Indian carriers, it said, was required to plug the leak caused by a large proportion of Indian long-haul international traffic travelling through connectivity hubs in the Middle East and Southeast Asia.

In the recent past, the government has been reluctant to grant requests from various jurisdictions, including Dubai, for allowing them rights to operate more flights into India. At the same time, Air India has strengthened its flight capacity to the U.S. and Europe as well as placed an order for 470 aircraft, including 70 widebody planes capable of flying non-stop on long-haul international routes.

Signalling its foray into long-haul air travel in April, IndiGo too, which thus far only comprised narrow-body planes, announced an agreement with Airbus for a firm order of 30 twin aisle A350s, along with purchase rights for an additional 70 of the same aircraft.

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At an industry event in June, Air India CEO Campbell Wilson urged a clear government policy on bilateral seat capacity, remarking that the airline was ordering new planes on the basis of an “economic return” expected from those investments and therefore if “the rug is pulled from under us, if we can’t fill the aircraft, we will not take them.”

On expanding airport capacity, the Economic Survey notes that while the number of airports in India has doubled since 2014 from 70 to over 140, there was a need to further “augment this capacity by adding more airports as well as expansion/upgradation of existing airports in the next five years” because of a large untapped market. “At around 0.13 air trips per capita, the current passenger air traffic is a fraction of India’s potential,” it noted.

It has also called for the need for “improving the efficiency and viability of airlines” in the backdrop of Go First and Jet Airways entering insolvency in the past five years.