Over 20 airlines have shut down in India since 1994, shows data released in Lok Sabha today. Replying to a question asked by Rajiv Pratap Rudy, a Member of Parliament in the Lok Sabha representing Saran in Bihar and an aviator himself; the Minister of State for Civil Aviation gave a detailed reply which threw light on the airlines which shut down ever since private carriers were allowed in Indian skies. The privatisation in Indian skies has come a long way from what started as “Air Taxi” concept and later converted to “scheduled airlines”.
Interested in buying Lapel pins? Click here
As part of the answer, a list was tabled which showed the airlines which have shut down and when. The list is represented below
Some of these airlines stopped flying much earlier but the year seems to indicate when the licence was formally suspended, surrendered or lapsed. In case of Modiluft, the airline came back as SpiceJet, while Air Deccan and Kingfisher had a reverse merger and name change, which was done to ensure that the start date of Air Deccan is considered for Kingfisher so that it can fly international quicker than waiting for five years, in what was then a 5/20 rule mandating airlines to wait for five years and have a fleet of 20 planes to start flying international.
Tail Note
India is often called a graveyard for airlines. However there is a pattern in this, the earliest airlines did not survive longer and it took a while stability to return. The same seems to happen with the smaller airlines which started with push from RCS-UDAN. Will there be a bunch of stable regional airlines in future?
Found this article informative? Think of supporting Network Thoughts with Power of 10
Running this website incurs some cost, along with the data sourced for analytics. If you have liked this article, consider paying INR 10 via UPI. The site will continue to be free. This will help with the maintenance, upkeep and funding the research. You can also pay via Debit or Credit card by clicking on this link.
You can support Network Thoughts by ordering Network Thoughts baggage tags !
Follow NetworkThoughts on X (Formerly Twitter), Bsky, Facebook and YouTube.