India's national carrier Air India has a checkered history. The airline, which literally took off following an intrepid solo effort from an scion of an industrialist family, has managed to ride out the global rough weather the industry went through to be a competitive yet caring airline. The scheduled services in India, in the real sense, began on Oct. 15, 1932. It was on this day that J.R.D. Tata, the father of Civil Aviation in India and founder of Air India, took off from Drigh Road Airport, Karachi, in a tiny, light, single-engine De Havilland Puss Moth on his flight to Mumbai (then known as Bombay) via Ahmedabad, a company press release said. He landed with his precious load of mail on a grass strip at Juhu, Mumbai. As he stepped out of the cockpit, his big step proved to be the giant leap for the nascent airline industry in the region. Air India now has a fleet of 127 aircraft comprising of B-787 Dreamliner, B777-200 LR, B777-300 ER, B747-400, A330-200, A320, A319, A321, B737-800 (AIX), CRJ-700 and ATR 42. On the international network, Air India operates weekly 21 nonstop flights to three destinations in the US – New York, Newark and Chicago from Mumbai /Delhi. State-of-the-art B777-200 LR and B777-300 ER aircraft, which offer comfortable seats, fly these routes. The seats in First Class cabin have been designed to offer the passenger comfort and luxury with exclusivity. Each First Class seat can be transformed into fully horizontal flat bed. The Executive Class cabin has spacious and comfortable 35 seats, which can be transformed into 72” long flat bed. On the Mumbai /Delhi to Jeddah, Riyadh, London, Frankfurt, Paris, Tokyo, Osaka, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Seoul routes, Air India operates B777-300 ER which offers four First Class, 35 Executive Class and 303 Economy Class seats. Both First and Executive class seats transform into full flat beds. On both these aircraft, passengers can enjoy 350 hours of audio/ video on demand. State-of-the-art Thales i500 Inflight Entertainment System which provides high noise immunity, makes traveling on the long haul flights a pleasure. Air India also operates to Bangkok, Singapore, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Muscat, Kuwait and Dammam. In South Asia, Air India operates to Colombo, Kabul, Katmandu, Yangon and Male. In addition to these international sectors, Air India operates to major domestic interior points with seamless connections. Air India operates weekly 14 flights from Jeddah to India — five flights to Kozhikode (Calicut) of which two are extended to Kochi (Cochin), four to Mumbai, three to Delhi and two to Hyderabad with comfortable B747-400 and B-777-300 ER aircraft. Air India has also introduced promotional schemes for passengers. It has a frequent flyer program branded “Flying Returns”. It is the most attractive frequent flying program, for Indian travelers can accrue mileage while flying Air India, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines and flights of Air India code share partners. The tie-ups with other partners such as credit cards, hotels and telecom companies, members can earn and transfer miles to Flying Returns program. Air India also offers, additional baggage allowance of 10 kg to the members of Flying Returns, for more details kindly log on to http://www.flyingreturns.co.in. Air India has recently introduced ‘Stopover Package' for passengers traveling through New Delhi's Terminal-3 (T3). The Stopover Package offers the facility of web-based hotel booking, Airport/Hotel transfer from Budget to Five Star category located in and around the Airport Zone are available including the hotels located inside Terminal-3 (T3) itself. Log into Air India website www.airindia.in for details. Air India is also offering the ‘Get Up Front' offer where passengers flying economy can avail an upgrade to Business Class at the airport subject to availability of seats by paying fixed amount of SR450 to travel from Jeddah to Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Calicut or Cochin. While it is $125 from India to Jeddah, subject to conditions.
