Tata-Owned Air India And AirAsia To Carry Each Other's Passengers In Case Of Flight Disruptions

In what can be seen as the first step towards integration and a future merger, Air India and AirAsia India, both owned by the Tata Group have decided to accept each other¡¯s domestic passengers in case one carrier¡¯s flights are disrupted.

Air India and Air Asia India (AAIPL) have signed an ¡°interline considerations on irregular operations¡± (IROPs) agreement in this regard to offer the first available alternate flights to the passengers.

Reuters

The validity of this arrangement is only in the domestic sector for a period of two years starting from February 10 till February 9, 2O24.

¡°The carriage of passengers shall be on an ¡®as available¡¯ basis as determined by the airport manager of accepting airline. Decision of airport manager of accepting airline would be final as regards availability of seats,¡± says the IROPs agreement.

What the agreement says

The agreement says that the departure of Air India should not be affected on account of the acceptance of stranded passengers of AirAsia India.

Tata Group which recently acquired Air India now has four airlines under their belt - full-service carrier Vistara, budget carrier AirAsia India, Air India, and its budget service Air India Express.

BCCL

They have a combined fleet strength of 233 aircraft.

Many analysts have said that even for the Tata Group, with all its resources, it will be impossible to maintain all these carriers as separate entities, competing against each other for passenger share.

Last month, Bhaskar Bhat, chairman of Tata SIA which operates Vistara had said that there are no talks of a merger of the two full-service airlines as of now.

"We have to run Vistara efficiently and coexist with Air India like any other airline," Bhat had said.

But an AirAsia India-Air India Express merger is very much likely and there have already been some talks in this regard.

Wikimedia

In November 2021, it was reported that Tata has commenced work on the merger of AirAsia India with Air India Express.

Tata Group owns 84% stake in AirAsia India and it is focused on budget travelers, just like Air India Express.

Ever since the forearm Tata Airlines which went on to become Air India returned to the Tata stable, the salt-to-steel conglomerate has been working to give the former national carrier an image makeover.

AP

This includes improving on-time performance, quality of on-board meals and overall grooming of its cabin crew members when they report for flights.

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