• PAGE ONE
• INDEX
• HOME

Virgin to announce service, fares soon

Ashwini Phadnis

NEW DELHI, March 7

VIRGIN Atlantic Airways (VAA) will announce the commencement of its flight on the London-Delhi sector within the next few weeks, the Airlines Head of Public Relations, Mr. Paul Moore, said.

``We are raring to go and aim to start services this summer. We hope to announce details of the service, including the fare, aircraft to be used and the date of starting, within the next few weeks,'' Mr. Moore told Business Line. He, however, refused to divulge details of the operations, saying that these would be made public at a later stage.

The airline had signed a code-share agreement with Air India in December last year allowing it to start a thrice-a-week service into India from summer this year.

Meanwhile, the market is split on whether the proposed VAA service will lead to a decline in fares on the India-UK sector. Senior officials of the Ministry of Civil Aviation and AI said that with several key players withdrawing from the Indian market, th e VAA service is unlikely to lead to capacity creation.

However, according to industry watchers, the present bilateral air services agreement signed between India and the UK in February this year, which allows British Airways to terminate all 16 weekly flights in India and the start of the VAA flight, may imp act fares. Sources said that the latest bilateral agreement virtually allowed BA to fly close to two to two-and-half more jumbo loads of passengers into India each week.

During his December visit, the VAA Chairman, Mr. Richard Branson, had said that the fares offered by the airline would be lower than BA. ``We will beat their fares even if it is only by a single British pound,'' he had said, while declining to specify th e fare his airline was to charge on the London-Delhi sector.

VAA has one of the youngest fleets of aircraft in the world, which includes 14 Boeing 747, 10 Airbus A-340 and three Airbus A-320 aircraft. It operates services to the US, Asia, the Caribbean and South Africa.