Tata Group and Singapore International Airlines (SIA) joint venture carrier, Vistara on Friday flew its first flight from New Delhi to Mumbai. The inaugural flight took off with passengers and guests including minister of state for civil aviation, Mahesh Sharma.
Vistara chairman Prasad Menon told reporters before the inaugural flight took off that the airline has entered the Indian aviation space at a time when existing players are going through a turbulent phase.
“We must do it right instead of making a big splash and getting into disappointment. Being full-service doesn’t mean you’re lavish or you’re over the top. It means serving different customers’ needs differently,” said Menon.
“You can’t start a business by being worried about competition but by believing you have a space. Competition is good for customers,” Menon added.
Vistara CEO Phee Teik Yeoh said he would like to invite India to fly the new feeling with this airline.
Tata Group’s chairman emeritus Ratan Tata said “it has been a long-cherished dream for the Tata Group to establish a world-class full-service airline in India” and he said he would dedicate this day to late JRD Tata, the former chairman of the group and India’s first licensed pilot.
“Today, that dream has come to life,” Tata said. The launch of the new full-service airline marks the re-entry of Tata Group in the airline business after over six decades. The group holds 30% stake in the domestic arm of the Malaysian budget airline AirAsia India, but it is not part of day-to-day operations.
Vistara currently has two leased 148 seater Airbus A320-200, with 16 seats in business class, 36 in premium economy and 96 in economy. Overall, Vistara will be the third full-service carrier in the country, after private carrier Jet Airways and state-owned Air India.
It is expected that the new airline will fill the void that was created after the grounding of Kingfisher Airlines in October 2012.
The airline will operate flights from its Delhi base to Goa, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Srinagar, Jammu and Patna in the first year, the airline had stated in the plan, submitted to DGCA at the time of applying for Air Operators Permit.
The airline plans to operate 87 flights in the first year, with five leased Airbus A-320s, and then scale it up to 301 flights by the fourth year with a fleet of A320s.
The JV was announced in September 2014 to launch a full-service carrier in the country. The two JV partners had made attempts to enter the domestic skies earlier too. However, it faced protests from Indian private airlines.