Earlier in the day, an IndiGo A320 passenger aircraft landed successfully at 1.32 pm at runway 08/26 of the under-construction Navi Mumbai International Airport, paving the way for the Navi Mumbai International Airport Ltd (NMIAL) to seek an aerodrome licence from the aviation safety regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to start commercial flight services.
A total of 17 pilots of Air India, IndiGo and Vistara died due to COVID-19 in May when the country saw the peak of the coronavirus pandemic's second wave, sources said on Thursday.
The price of aviation turbine fuel has increased by 50 per cent since January and the situation has adversely impacted IndiGo, its CEO Ronojoy Dutta said on Wednesday. He said the government should bring aviation turbine fuel (ATF) under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and make flying affordable for consumers and viable for airlines. IndiGo is India's largest airline and with around 55 per cent share in the domestic passenger market.
'We don't give any guidance about profitability. We have internal targets but we don't discuss them publicly.'
Flight services at Mumbai airport were severely impacted on Monday due to low visibility after heavy rains in the city, leading to runway operations being shut for over an hour and approximately 50 flights being cancelled, sources said.
The airline will be inducting large number of A321s this year which will be largely used on international routes and high density domestic routes.
FSSAI is looking to tap the Airport Health Organisation to ensure that such incidents aren't reported in the future.
The genesis of the arbitration lies in a bitter public battle that began in July when Rakesh Gangwal wrote to capital market regulator Sebi alleging lack of corporate governance in the company. He alleged that Rahul Bhatia, who holds controlling power of the company, had used it to execute questionable related-party transactions.
Based on the Skytrax ranking for 2018, IndiGo is number two among the best low-cost carriers in Asia, behind rival AirAsia.
Of the 48 flights, which are not being operated as part of the curtailed schedule, 42 are of IndiGo and six of GoAir.
IndiGo has confirmed the delivery of the next set of 25 ATR-72 jets and will be inducting around 10 planes by the end of this calendar year, making it the largest regional fleet operator in the country.
It is for the first time in the history of IndiGo that we have undertaken such a painful measure, CEO Ronojoy Dutta said.
On February 19, India's largest private low-fare airline IndiGo announced the resignation of one of the two founders, Rakesh Gangwal, from the airline's board and his intentions of offloading his stake in the airline over the next five years. The announcement came on a Friday, giving the stock markets the weekend to absorb the news but the markets registered a tepid response on Monday's opening. In contrast, in July 2019, when the fight between the two founders and erstwhile friends first became public, the markets reacted savagely. The IndiGo scrip at the time fell 19 per cent, wiping out millions of rupees of shareholder wealth before bouncing back. For readers who may be hazy on the details of the dispute, here is the context.
Kamra allegedly heckled Goswami, the editor of Republic TV, on IndiGo's Mumbai-Lucknow (6E5317) flight on Tuesday.
Lessor market sources said with the fuel prices remaining high, IndiGo would get better rates for the fuel-efficient A320neos.
According to the annual report, Ronojoy Dutta's remuneration package includes a gross annual salary of $1.27 million, which would be payable in rupees. Also, he is entitled for a commitment bonus payout. In FY20, he received a remuneration of Rs 11.4 crore in his role as CEO and whole-time director.
While IndiGo had 11.8 per cent of all the international seats to and fro India in the last week of August, Air India's seat share was 11.4 per cent. Emirates came third with 8.1 per cent, and rest of the airlines constituted 68 per cent of the seat share.
IndiGo's co-founder and interim CEO Rahul Bhatia said profitability was significantly impacted by costs pressure from the increases in fuel price and the depreciation of rupee as well as competitive fare environment.
Cyclonic storm Fengal has commenced making landfall close to Puducherry and it may approximately take 4 hours for it to cross the coast completely, an India Meteorological Department (IMD) official said. The process of the cyclone's landfall commenced at about 5.30 pm on November 30. The IMD said the forward sector of spiral bands associated with the cyclone has entered into the land and is likely to move west-southwestwards and cross north Tamil Nadu-Puducherry coasts between Karaikal and Mahabalipuram close to Puducherry as a cyclonic storm with a wind speed of 70-80 kmph gusting to 90 kmph during next 3 to 4 hours.
The introduction of these new flights would help IndiGo cross 650 flights mark as the it would offer a total of 671 flights per day connecting 39 destinations.
'IndiGo 2018 is a harsh, ultra-lean, mean, zero asset, fighting machine with aspirations of taking on the global long-haul low-cost market.'
IndiGo has been facing a probe by Sebi ever since a public spat came to light between two founders of the airline, including over certain related party transactions involving one of the warring promoters.
Air India, which operates 72 weekly flights from various cities to Dubai, and IndiGo cancelled their services on Wednesday.
IndiGo's president and director Aditya Ghosh apologised for the incident and said stern action was taken against an airline staff for manhandling the passenger.
In June IndiGo had implemented a mandatory leave without pay program for 1.5 days to 5 days. Subsequently, in July, IndiGo announced 5.5 additional days of LWP for its pilots, taking the effective number of LWP to 10 days. As cost cutting measure, the airline had also let go of 10 per cent of its employees and implemented a pay cut across the board.
The founders of IndiGo may have thought it's time to go for a rejig of the top leadership team which can take care of the growing demands of an airline that has grown much bigger than they could have ever imagined, says Shyamal Majumdar.
Aditya Ghosh, with no prior aviation background or MBA degree, managed not only to become the CEO of an airline but even piloted it to the top with almost half of the market.
The carrier said for domestic flights the fees for cancellation and changes would now be Rs 3,500 and Rs 3,000 respectively, if it was done within three days of the flight's departure. Before this announcement, IndiGo charged a flat rate of Rs 3,000 and Rs 2,500 for cancellation and detail changes on domestic tickets.
IndiGo has proposed to issue 185,000 shares worth to Chief Executive and Whole-time Director Ronojoy Dutta under the company's Employee Stock Option Plan (ESOP). The shares that can be exercised at a price of Rs 765 apiece is worth Rs 14,15,25,000. Dutta can exercise 25 per cent of that at the end of first year, 35 per cent at the end of second year, and the remaining in December 2023 when his current tenure ends.
Chadha also said there is a possibility that fog in Delhi and a recent air show in Mumbai may have added to the troubles of the airline.
Analysts remain sceptical on the profitability from freighter business, saying that once normal air transport resumes and there's abundant belly capacity, the traditional economics of air cargo may not be that lucrative.
Given its network and fleet, it has garnered the highest share of passenger growth.
Despite having started at least a decade later than Jet Airways, IndiGo accounts for the lion's share in the domestic market
Gangwal said he will not vote in favour of resolutions that intend to expand the size of the board to 10 members. Gangwal wants a seven-member board.
People in the know said the move would impact around 110 engines, virtually putting a spanner on the expansion plans of IndiGo - counted among the fastest growing airlines in the world.
Mahatma Gandhi showed India how to fight for Independence using khadi. Today khadi and handloom have become one of the many incredible faces India shows the world.
The aircraft was taken to an isolated bay for a secondary ladder point check after a Bomb Threat Assessment Committee (BTAC) found the threat as 'specific', the sources said.
Protocols for the Bomb Threat Assessment Committee (BTAC), convened in the event of a bomb threat call to an aircraft or airport, have been tweaked to better tackle the spate of the ongoing 'random' Internet-based threats being made to various Indian airlines, official sources said Tuesday.
In a December 2012 interview, Ratan Tata, then preparing to step down as chairman of Tata Sons, expressed doubts about the Tata group re-entering the aviation sector, calling it a space plagued by "destructive competition". But beneath that frustration lay nearly two decades of failed attempts to conquer the Indian skies. In 1994, Tata, along with Singapore Airlines, had plans to launch a joint venture (JV) airline in India.
IndiGo, India's largest airline, is in talks to raise fresh funds as a second wave of pandemic has led to collapse in travel demand. The airline may look to raise Rs 3,500-4,000 crore. On Monday, only 97,761 passengers flew. With flyers cancelling bookings, airlines had to put aside flights and operated only 1,306 of them.
