30 additional daily flights from State

This is part of winter schedule effective from October 27

Various airlines will operate 30 additional flights daily from the four international airports in the State to destinations within the country and abroad in the winter schedule effective from October 27.

Of these, five will be domestic flights from Thiruvananthapuram international airport to Delhi. This was announced by Union Civil Aviation Secretary Pradeep Singh Kharola at a meeting of the chief executive officers of airlines here on Saturday.

The Civil Aviation Secretary also promised to look into the demand for refuelling facility for overseas flights in Thiruvananthapuram. The Civil Aviation Ministry stepped in after Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan took up the concern of the government over the reduction of 1,579 flights, including 1,005 in the international sector, in the April-June period this year from the premier airports, despite reduction in tax on ATF from 25% to 5% in three airports and to 1% in the Kannur international airport.

At a meeting convened by the State government and the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the Chief Minister had said that his government was ready to further bring down the tax on ATF if the airlines came forward to operate more flights.

Pointing out the steep hike in the airfares from the State to destinations in West Asia and in the domestic sector, Mr. Vijayan said this was against the decision taken at the May 2017 meeting of the airline CEOs. The Chief Minister suggested additional flights during the festive season and intervention of the ministry to check hike in fares.

Mr. Vijayan brought to the attention of the Civil Aviation Secretary that the demand for direct flights from the airports in the State to the U.S. and European countries was still in paper. The State took up the demand for flights with business class to East Asia from the capital in view of the winding up of operations of Silk Air to Singapore.

The Chief Minster urged the Airports Authority of India (AAI) to provide more concessions to flights operating to Thiruvananthapuram and Karipur airports as an incentive to attract them as the flights from these two airports had 90% load.

Chairman of the AAI Anuj Agarwal said the demand of the operating airlines to reduce the user fee, parking fee and landing fee in the premier airport could be considered only in 2021.