Domestic flights to resume services in Kolkata on May 28

KOLKATA: Domestic flights to and from Kolkata will resume from May 28 (Thursday), instead of May 25 (Monday), following a request of Bengal government on Saturday, which cited the twin crisis of Covid-19 pandemic and cyclone disaster in south Bengal. Flights to Bagdogra will also resume on May 28.
The decision was conveyed to Kolkata airport director Kaushik Bhattacharjee by the ministry of civil aviation secretary Pradeep Singh Kharola on Sunday evening, hours before the first flight was slated to take off from the city on Monday morning.All airlines were on tenterhooks till the decision was announced around 7.45pm on Sunday.

Sources said the number of flights would also be scaled down significantly from around 93 mentioned in the initial list to around 20. The Maharashtra government has limited the number of Mumbai- bound flights to 25 while Telangana government has said it will allow only 15 flights to Hyderabad.
The delay in operations has led to discontentment among flyers, airlines and travel agents with the ire being directed at the civil aviation ministry and regulator DGCA for not consulting the states before announcing the commencement date.
“The manner, in which the flight resumption was handled, is immature and ad hoc. More planning and coordination goes into introduction of an inter-state bus route. The opinions of the state government should have been sought before the date was announced. That would have spared so much confusion in the industry and people,” said travel agent Manoj Saraf.
While GoAir had refused to open its bookings from May 25, citing the lack of clarity and confusion over the flight operations, other airines that went by the DGCA order and opened bookings are now in a quandary over what to do with hundreds of passengers who have booked flights between May 25 and May 27.
“This is the third instance of bookings being opened and then flights being cancelled since the lockdown was announced. Not only does this lead to loss of passenger confidence in the airline, it also reflects very poorly on the airline industry in India,” said an airline official.
Confused over whether this will again lead to problems in refunding the tickets, passengers frantically called travel agents and airline offices. Till late on Sunday, there was no clarity on the issue. “Many passengers already have their money stuck in credit notes issued earlier by airlines. But processing the credit notes for tickets purchased via travel agents is still a problem. Those desperate to travel put in their money again to book tickets. What will happen if it gets stuck in credit notes once again?" he said.