Foreign carriers to pick up staff from cash-strapped SpiceJet.
The fairy tale turnaround story has, however, taken a few knocks after a second wave of the pandemic has brought a series of default notices and has posed the toughest test for the 55-year old Singh to save the airline he founded and sold to the Marans only to assume control later.
The pattern of domestic airlines receiving bomb threats to their flights continued for the fourth day as two international flights, one each of Vistara and IndiGo, were targeted in the similar manner on Thursday.
SpiceJet on Tuesday said shareholders have approved the transfer of its cargo and logistics services business to a subsidiary, on a slump sale basis, through an all-share deal worth over Rs 2,555 crore, a move that will help the airline to significantly reduce its negative networth. Besides, the shareholders have cleared the proposal to raise up to Rs 2,500 crore through the Qualified institutional placement (QIP) route. These developments also come at a time when the airline industry is slowly recovering after being battered by the coronavirus pandemic.
Passengers are not allowed to walk on the Delhi airport's tarmac area as it is a security risk. There is a demarcated path on the tarmac for vehicles only.
More than 30 flights of various Indian airlines, including Vistara, Air India and IndiGo, received bomb threats on Saturday, according to sources.
On May 1, SpiceJet's Mumbai-Durgapur flight encountered severe turbulence during its descent phase, injuring 14 passengers and three cabin crew members.
A threat about the presence of bombs on an Akasa Air flight at Biju Patnaik International Airport in Bhubaneswar was received on social media, but it later turned out to be a hoax, an official of the airport said on Thursday.
The episode has been classified as an 'accident' as it has left serious injuries on passengers and crew members, the sources mentioned.
On a full year basis, the airline made a loss of Rs 934.8 crore. The company has incurred a net loss during the current and previous year and, the its current liabilities exceeded its current assets
Stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra has once again found himself at the center of a controversy, this time for his comments about Maharashtra's Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde. Kamra has been a controversial figure for years, with his comedy often targeting politicians and other public figures. This latest incident has led to a backlash from Shinde's supporters, who have vandalized the venue of Kamra's show. Kamra has a history of making controversial remarks, including heckling a TV anchor on a flight and making comments about the judiciary.
The country's largest airline IndiGo and Air India have asked passengers to reach Delhi airport at least 3.5 hours prior to domestic departures.
SpiceJet said its flight heading to Jabalpur returned to Delhi on Saturday after the crew members observed smoke in the cabin at around 5,000-feet altitude.
Indian carriers transported 12.8 million domestic passengers in March 2023, a year-on-year growth of 21.41 per cent. India's largest carrier IndiGo shored up its domestic market share from 53.8 per cent in Q4 of FY22 to 55.7 per cent in Q4 of FY23, according to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) data released on Monday.
The sources said that during the boarding, the male passenger behaved in an unruly manner and touched the female cabin crew member inappropriately.
SpiceJet had bet its fortunes heavily on the new version of the 737 of which it has 13 planes in its fleet and another 193 aircraft on order
The Spicejet aircraft took off at around 12.10 pm, and according to residents of localities adjacent to the airport, who claimed to have witnessed the spectacle, it caught fire immediately.
With airlines reporting multiple technical malfunction incidents, aviation regulator DGCA on Monday said it conducted spot checks and found that there is an insufficient number of engineering personnel certifying planes of various carriers before their departure. Before each departure, an aircraft is checked and certified by an aircraft maintenance engineer (AME). The DGCA has now issued guidelines for airlines on the deployment of AME personnel and directed them to comply by July 28.
The number of domestic air travelers in India grew 2.42 per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) in April, reaching 13.2 million, according to data by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Tuesday.
The bone of contention between the two sides relates to changes in the purchase terms.
A bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana took note of the submissions of senior advocate Harish Salve that SpiceJet would try to resolve the issue with the Swiss firm. "Senior counsel Harish Salve sought three weeks' time for trying to resolve the matter and Mr K V Vishwanathan (appearing for the Swiss firm) also agreed to the adjournment. "Meanwhile, the high court order is stayed for three weeks," the bench, also comprising justices A S Bopanna and Hima Kohli, ordered.
Kalanithi Maran claims deal with Ajay Singh is dead; SpiceJet spokesperson says Maran's claims are baseless and false
Amid a massive global outage that hit operations of airlines, banks and businesses across the globe, Microsoft on Friday said that it is aware of the issue affecting Windows devices due to an update from a third-party software platform.
Loans for Indian airlines have dried up as banks have become cautious to lend to the sector.
Indigo has zero competition on 61.2 per cent of its 838 domestic routes.
'The girls will do well, I hope we get one or two medals. It could be a silver or may be even a gold.'
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.
It takes only two hours - roughly the time it takes for a plane to fly from Delhi to Mumbai - for a pair of pilots to complete their training on the 737 MAX simulator at Boeing's centre in Noida, the only one of its kind in India. Going by this estimate, all the 90 Spicejet pilots who the civil aviation regulator barred from flying the 737 MAX can be retrained in 90 hours.
Many argue that the airline could achieve its full potential if Nusli Wadia were to run it the way he does Britannia.
SpiceJet is the first Indian low fare airline to establish such an arrangement with a foreign airline.
These slots, under the air bubble pact, will later be extended to operate regular flight services once international flight services resumes.
Despite the gains from Jet's closure, in 2018 and 2019, the airline continued to make losses in many quarters for a variety of reasons, including some mistakes like taking on Jet's aircraft, which were not in great shape and had business class configuration, a gamble that did not work for SpiceJet.
A SpiceJet spokesperson said, 'On May 1, SpiceJet Boeing B737 aircraft operating flight SG-945 from Mumbai to Durgapur encountered severe turbulence during descent which unfortunately resulted in injuries to a few passengers.'
For any airline to be eligible for restructuring, the current ratio has to be equal to or higher than 0.4, while 'debt to Ebitda' has to be equal to or less than 5.5.
Concerned about the deteriorating financial and operational performance of the Kalanithi Maran-promoted airline, the DGCA had on Friday withdrawn 186 flight slots of SpiceJet and directed it not to take bookings for flights beyond a month.
Capa lauded govt's efforts in rescuing SpiceJet.
SpiceJet, Air India Express and IndiGo will operate special flights from Hungarian capital Budapest and Romania's Bucharest on Monday and Tuesday to evacuate Indians stranded in Ukraine due to the Russian military offensive.
The Madras high court has ordered the winding up of private carrier SpiceJet Limited and directed the official Liquidator attached to the high court to take over its assets, in a plea filed by a Swiss company over unpaid dues. The court was allowing a company petition from Credit Suisse AG, a stock corporation registered under the laws of Switzerland, which prayed for winding up of the Indian firm under the provisions of the Companies Act, 1956 and appoint the Official Liquidator of the high court as the liquidator with all powers under Section 448 of the Companies Act to take charge of SpiceJet's assets, properties, stock in trade and books of accounts. The "respondent company (SpiceJet) has miserably failed to satisfy the three pronged test suggested by the Supreme Court in Mathusudan Govardhandas & Co v Madhu Woollen Industries (P) Ltd, and hence had rendered itself liable to be wound up for its inability to pay its debts under Section 433 (e) of the Companies Act 1956," Justice R Subramanian said in his order on Monday and directed the private carrier be wound up and the official liquidator take over its assets.
The load factor of six major domestic airlines--IndiGo, SpiceJet, Air India, GoAir, Vistara and AirAsia India -- stood between 70 per cent and 64.9 per cent in January.
Though SpiceJet is likely to resume flights, experts have a doubt on the airline's financial capabilities.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances