Bahrain Air to expand in India

Bahrain Air is looking to expand its footprints in towns and cities such as Trichy, Delhi, Coimbatore, Mangalore and Nagpur, among others, to tap travellers to the Middle East. V R Santosh, country manager India, said on Tuesday, “We have plans to expand operations from (Trichy, Mangalore and Delhi) but can only do so after the government’s approval.”

The carrier also started daily flights between Mumbai and Bahrain, its third connection after Calicut and Cochin.

Santosh said, “There is enough labour traffic from these towns travelling to the Middle East and we expect to get good load factors.” From Calicut and Cochin, it gets loads factors of 70-75%, he added. Even in these times of slowdown, the Middle East sector is one of the most profitable. Many airlines have started services on the sector.

While bigger carriers such as Etihad Airways and
Emirates Airlines are the major operators on the sector, new airlines such as Air Arabia also connect Indian cities to the Middle East. Domestic carriers like Jet Airways and Kingfisher, too, are looking to increase services on this sector.

Bahrain Air is positioning itself as a low-cost airline that also offers premium class seats. This, the airline expects, will differentiate its services. “There is a possibility of low cost structure and lower fares in premium class as well, which is what we are exploring,” said Bart C J Schellens, director (commercial operations), Bahrain Air.