New Delhi, March 19 Buoyed by the acceleration of anti-Covid-19 vaccination drive, Tata-SIA airline Vistara expects regular short-haul international operations to commence in the next 3-6 months.
Notably, the current international flights are operated under the 'Air Bubble' agreements between India and other countries.
This special arrangement mandates certain prerequisites along with permissions which are needed for passengers to undertake travel.
However, regular scheduled services by the airline were being undertaken during the Pre-Covid period to destinations like Singapore, Dubai, Colombo, Bangkok and Kathmandu.
In an interaction Vistara's Chief Commercial Officer Vinod Kannan told that it might take at least 3-6 more months to resume short-haul international operations within the subcontinent based on bilateral government approvals.
"While global rollout of the vaccine has begun in full swing, resumption of regular international air travel is still some time away," he said.
"Therefore, we feel travel bubble agreements will continue for a while and it may take us at least 3-6 more months to resume short-haul international operations within the subcontinent based on bilateral government approvals, while long-haul air travel may take at least till the end of the year to resume."
He said the airline is keen on long-haul direct flights operations from India and has been steadily growing its global network under travel bubble agreements.
In fact, the airline's six of the seven destinations were added during the ongoing pandemic, under travel bubble agreements.
"We are pursuing discussions with other like-minded global airlines for partnerships to be able to provide our customers an extended global network while strengthening our international presence."
According to Kannan, vaccines' rollouts have led to significant improvement in overall market sentiment and "given lot of hope to the industry".
"Especially in India, it has been very positive, given the country's role in controlling the spread of virus has been lauded by leaders from around the world,"
Besides, he cited the gradual but steady return of demand across customer segments.
"The passenger traffic, we see right now is a mix of people returning to their homes or to their cities of occupation, VFR
( With inputs from IANS )
Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor