Government inaugurates 22 new routes under RCS
- Till date, 57 unserved and underserved airports with 347 routes have been operationalised under the RCS across the length and breadth of India.
New Delhi: The Indian government has inaugurated 22 new routes under the regional connectivity scheme (RCS), six of which have been operationalized in North East India.
These include Shillong-Agartala, Shillong-Silchar, Dibrugarh-Dimapur, Gorakhpur-Lucknow, Kurnool- Bangalore, Visakhapatnam-Chennai, Agra- Bangalore- Bhopal, Prayagraj-Bhubaneswar-Bhopal, among others.
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Till date, 57 unserved and underserved airports (including five heliports and two water aerodromes) with 347 routes have been operationalised under the RCS across the length and breadth of India, the ministry of civil aviation said in a statement on Tuesday.
The ministry said that while the country's largest domestic operator IndiGo was awarded the Shillong-Agartala, Shillong-Silchar, Kurnool-Bangalore, Visakhapatnam-Chennai routes under the fourth round of RCS bidding process, last year, Air India's subsidiary Alliance Air bagged Lucknow-Gorakhpur route under the third round of RCS bidding process.
"The operationalisation of these routes aligns with the objectives of UDAN ( Ude Desh ka Aam Naagrik) regional connectivity scheme to strengthen the aerial network of the country, create affordable, yet economically viable and profitable air travel on regional routes," the statement added.
Mint had in February reported that India’s ambitious aim to link its smaller towns and cities to the wider air travel network through the RCS is struggling about four years after it was kicked off
Only about 40% of the routes awarded so far are active, with airlines shying away from using most of the routes, wary of inadequate infrastructure and low demand.
Regional airlines, despite earning exclusivity on RCS routes, use smaller aircraft to cope with low demand. This drives up costs and hurts commercial viability.
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Government subsidies often don’t cover the entire cost while fares on such routes are capped, hindering airlines’ ability to make such flights sustainable.
Regional carriers such as Air Deccan have halted flights while TruJet, Zoom Air and Air Heritage have scaled down their operations due to the pandemic.
Aviation consultancy CAPA India said in a presentation in February on regional aviation that most domestic airlines are struggling to recover their cost as airfares in India remain one of the lowest in the world. The price sensitivity is more pronounced in regional routes.
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