Dubai: Emirates Airline may land more traffic rights to India when the governments of the UAE and India begin fresh talks for increasing bilateral air traffic rights in May this year.
The talks come amid reports that another UAE-based airline, Etihad Airways, is finalising a deal where it will pick up 24 percent stake in India’s Jet Airways.
Through this deal, Etihad is obviously keen to gain greater access to the Indian aviation market, where bilateral rights have been frozen for the last five years.
But the Etihad-Jet deal may unintentionally help Emirates too since it has also been seeking much greater access to Indian aviation market for years.
Speaking at the launch of a new concourse dedicated to the Airbus 380 superjumbo aircraft at Dubai International Airport, Emirates’ President Tim Clark made it clear that Emirates wanted far more access to India than it was allowed at present.
11/02/13 Sindhu Bhattacharya/First Post
