One of the many announcements on the sidelines of the CAPA Indian Aviation Summit 2024 was the interesting intentions of Air India Express. The no-frills subsidiary of Air India wanted to become the first carrier operating in the Delhi NCR region to operate out of two airports. It had also announced flights out of the Ghaziabad defence airport, Hindon, then had to withdraw the announcement in August 2024.

Air India Express announces the launch of flights from Hindon Airport.

Air India Express announced that it will expand its National Capital Region (NCR) network by operating 19 weekly direct flights connecting Hindon (Ghaziabad) with Bengaluru, Goa, and Kolkata. These flights will be over and above the operations from the IGI Airport, Delhi. Flight operations will commence on March 1, 2025.

Air India Express expects that their operations out of Hindon Airport will help them garner those who travel from other cities in Western UP, Uttarakhand and Haryana, such as Noida, Alipur, Agra, Baghpat, Bulandshahr, Dadri, Dasna, Dehradun, Faridnagar, Hapur, Haridwar, Khekra, Loni, Meerut, Modinagar, Muradnagar, Noida, Nangloi Jat,  Pilkhuwa, Panipat, Rishikesh, Saharanpur, and Sonipat. In Delhi NCR itself, Air India Express is positioning Hindon as a convenient alternative for travellers from Central and East Delhi, Noida, and nearby areas such as Akshardham, Anand Vihar, Parliament Street and Central Secretariat, Chandni Chowk, Connaught Place, Indirapuram, Karol Bagh, Vaishali and surrounding regions.

Air India Express will operate one 6x weekly direct flight to/from Bengaluru and Goa, to be launched on March 1, 2025. A daily direct flight to Kolkata will also be added on the same day. This whole rotation is clearly being worked with one aircraft operating the following rotation, CCU-HDO-GOI-HDO-CCU and another one doing a BLR-HDO-BLR rotation.

The last time this announcement was made, Bengaluru was a double daily flight, and there were also plans to launch a flight to Chennai. These might still be on the radar, and we could hear about them later.

Where is Hindon Airport?

Hindon has been a critical Air Force base for the Indian Air Force, being the primary airbase around Delhi. The airbase is located in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh, towards the eastern side of Delhi (compared to the Indira Gandhi Airport, which is in the South West). The airbase got a civil terminal only in 2019 when growing at the IGI Airport became a problem.

Hindon Airport came to be to add more regional air connectivity flights under the RCS scheme, and currently, only flybig and Star Air operate from this airport. flybig operates their Twin Otters to Bathinda, Ludhiana and Dehradun, while Star Air operates to Nanded, Kishangarh and Adampur.

It is amusing that Air India Express gets to launch flights from here because there exists an agreement between Delhi International Airport Limited and the Government of India that prohibits the operation of commercial flights within a 150-kilometre radius of DEL. There was a carveout for the regional connectivity scheme flights, which came through.

However, even that was supposed to lapse when the IGI expansion was completed (technically, it is still ongoing). This comes close with the launch of the Jewar Airport in the coming months, so is this a launch intended for the long run, or to start accumulating experience and move to Jewar when the airport goes live? We don’t know yet.

I see the instant appeal for this airport to those who live in East Delhi, Noida and other eastern suburbs of Delhi to commute between Delhi and Bengaluru.

Bottomline

Air India Express has announced the launch of flights from Hindon to Bengaluru, Goa and Kolkata in March 2025, with a 6X weekly flight to BLR and GOI and a daily flight to Kolkata in the coming days. The launch of these flights will make Air India Express the first carrier to have a dual operation in Delhi NCR.

What do you think about the appeal of an airport at Hindon, however small, for a few flights a day?

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