Manila! Air India announces flights to Philippines 

Tata owned Air India has (finally) announced flights to Manila. There was a lull fter adding Phuket, Ho Chi Minh City and Kuala Lumpur in ASEAN, the airline has now announced the launch of flights to Manila, the capital of Philippines from Delhi – the Indian capital and the hub of Air India. The airline will deploy the A321neo aircraft on this route and operate five times a week, with flights on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays. The timings would be as below

The airline will operate to Terminal 1, while other fellow Star Alliance carriers operate from Terminal 3. However, Philippines Airlines uses Terminal 1 as its hub, probably indicating partnership with the airline going forward. Ninoy Aquino International Airport serves as the gateway to Manila and is one of the most congested airports. In 2019, Philippines Airlines had announced flights to Delhi. The flights were to begin from April. In a surprising twist, the airline pulled out at the last minute, citing airspace closure as one of the reasons. The airspace closure was on the western front after Pakistan closed its airspace for Indian traffic following the surgical strike on Balakot by the Indian Air Force. The world changed drastically in 2020 with the pandemic and new route launches were possibly the last thing in mind for any airline until the travel boom now. Ironic as it may sound, there is airspace closure again!

In 2018, the countries amended bilateral air services agreement to have 28 flight frequencies per week from each side between the two countries. There has been no connectivity since then, though Philippines Airlines operated flights to India until 2011 via Bangkok. Jet Airways had come close to launching flights between Mumbai and Manila in 2012 but the plan was dropped even before the first flight. Manila, Cebu and Davao are the top three airports in the Philippines but it is unlikely that the Indian side would ask for flying to airports beyond Manila. Philippines is the largest country in ASEAN to not be connected with India, the only two countries which do not have connectivity is Laos, with all other countries having direct connectivty to India.

The Philippines is the twelfth most populated country in the world and has seen a huge influx of tourists in the last few years. Additionally, Filipinos have migrated to various parts of the world, which Air India would want to get a slice off via its Delhi hub. India has a trade surplus with the Philippines with India exporting Pharma products along with Aircraft parts while India imports Pearls, Electrical machinery and other items from the Philippines.  

Connectivity the king

The flight timings connect well to Air India’s European bank with this five times a week flight connecting to London, Frankfurt, Paris, Milan on all days of operations of Manila flights. 

Over a period of time, Air India would want to offer daily flights to all European destinations and likewise to those in Asia, which will improve the connectivity index and make the flights popular for transit traffic. 

The airline will be in a better position to command yields once the refurbishment is completed by the airline. Currently, the airline has been on the receiving end on social media for issues with hardware – something which it inherited from the government run airline. 

Network Thoughts

There is never a spoke to many when it comes to building a hub. However, airline networks are seldom built purely on connecting traffic. Manila was the last big missing link from Delhi airport’s network in my personal opinion and I have been voicing it for a while. With Manila flights in place, what next for Air India and Delhi? For Air India, it would need better connectivity for Ho Chi Minh City and a possible spoke to Jakarta, bilaterals permitting. For Delhi, it should aim to have 150 non-stop destinations (Domestic + International) soon, though it covered that number with one-stop same flight number flights last year. With places like Minsk, Yerevan and all the Central Asian Republics connected, the next frontier could be eastern Europe when IndiGo inducts the XLR over the next one year and announced Athens as its destination once the XLRs are available. 

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