Dubai, Abu Dhabi may stay out of bounds for Jet

Dubai, Abu Dhabi may stay out of bounds for Jet
8 Oct, 2007, 0332 hrs IST,Nirbhay Kumar, TNN

NEW DELHI: The government is unlikely to permit Jet Airways to fly to Dubai and Abu Dhabi in the near future. The Naresh Goyal-owned airline, which managed to obtain permission recently to launch flights to various destinations in the Gulf routes, has been pushing hard for permission to launch flights to these two destinations since they are considered highly profitable. At this juncture, the government does not want to allocate traffic rights for Dubai and Abu Dhabi to any other carrier except Air India, government sources said.

The national carrier has a right of first refusal for all overseas routes and the Gulf region was exclusively reserved for it till recently. While the government has cleared Jet Airways flights to Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain, the private sector airline was not allotted traffic rights to Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

“We have maintained that the public sector carrier would have the first choice to fly on any international route. Air India has conveyed to us that it would use the remaining bilateral entitlements for Dubai and Abu Dhabi leaving no scope for other carrier,” an official in the ministry of civil aviation told ET.

“Jet Airways had applied for Amritsar-Birmingham route but the request was turned down as Air India also showed its interest in the sector,” he said.

Total entitlements of Indian carriers to Dubai and Abu Dhabi stand at 21,950 and 7,420 seats per week, respectively. Following its merger with Indian, Air India is utilising 20,002 seats per week for Dubai and 3,313 for Abu Dhabi. The utilisation would be higher if the airline had more aircraft.

Delivery of the 111 aircraft ordered by the airline has just started and capacity is expected to be augmented soon. Chances of Jet getting into the Dubai and Abu Dhabi routes has also been turned bleak by a recently allegation by UAE that Air India was exceeding its entitlements. It is understood that the authorities in Dubai have written to their counterparts in India to complain that the national carrier was going beyond the entitlements allocated to the Inidan side.

However, civil aviation ministry officials feel that the allegation from the UAE side could be due to miscalculation. In their view, Air India’s operations were well within the entitlements provided under bilateral agreements. To be sure of its position, the ministry has asked Air India and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to verify the details. “We have asked DGCA to submit a report on current entitlement utilisation of Indian carriers with Dubai,” the official said.

In July, Jet Airways had applied for rights on routes to Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Dubai and Abu Dhabi. In September, the government granted the airline rights to operate on Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain from January 1, 2008.
The Gulf and Middle-East segment accounts for close to 40% of total outbound airline traffic from India.

Air India now has 45% market share in the Gulf and Middle-East segment. After the US, Gulf contributes the maximum revenue to the airline’s kitty. In 2005-06, the total revenue earned from this sector stood at 1,590.04 crore. During the same period, the India-US route contributed Rs 2,865.08 crore.

“Jet’s request for granting traffic rights on India-Dubai and India-Abu Dhabi routes is under the consideration,” the civil aviation ministry had said in a statement last month.