Alliance Air to launch flights in new routes in 2 months: CEO

: Alliance Air, the wholly-owned subsidiary of Air India has chalked out aggressive expansion plans which include launch of flights to newer destinations, a top official has said.

Alliance Air recently launched its maiden overseas flight from Chennai to Jaffna making it the 55th destination connected by the airline.

Alliance Air CEO C S Subbiah said the airline would connect various cities including Jagdalpur, Raipur, Gulbarga and Hubli among others.

"We are look at flying to Jagdalpur, Gulbarga. These are the two new routes. The flight from Gulbarga will connect to Bengaluru and later to Chennai," he told PTI.

Jagdalpur route would be connected from Hyderabad then later to Raipur and then it would go to Bhopal, he said.

Subbiah said Alliance Air was utilising the Centre's UDAN scheme one hundred per cent and added that they were "forerunners" operating under the scheme.

UDAN (Ude Desh Ka Aam Naagrik) scheme commenced in 2017, is a regional airport development and Regional Connectivity Scheme (RCS) aimed at making air travel affordable.

Under the scheme, 50 per cent seats in aeroplanes are offered at concessional rates to passengers.

Elaborating on the proposal to launch new flights, Subbiah said, "In 2015 we were hardly in 15 stations. Under (Air India CMD) Lohani's leadership we are now connecting 54 destinations. The 55th route was Chennai to Jaffna."
To a query on the launch of service in Western parts of the country, he said, "we are starting Nashik to Pune. And then, we are starting from Ahmedabad to Kandla."