In an interesting turn of events, Ashwani Lohani, Chairman & Managing Director, Air India has written to Rajneesh Kumar, Chairman, State Bank of India and has offered to fly 5 grounded B777s of Jet Airways. The letter has been written following his telephonic conversation with Kumar earlier today.
“We, at Air India, are indeed saddened by the turn of affairs at Jet Airways, a scenario that is causing considerable inconvenience to the travelling public. In tune with Air India’s role and responsibilities as the National Carrier, we would be happy to alleviate this inconvenience by considering the possibility of operating a few B777 aircrafts, on their established routes that as per media reports stand suspended at present”, Lohani wrote in his letter.
The letter went on to mention the established routes which are “Mumbai-London-Mumbai, Delhi-London-Delhi, Mumbai-Dubai-Mumbai, Delhi-Dubai-Delhi, Del-Singapore-Delhi”.
“Subject to approvals and financial viability, we can examine the possibility of taking five B777’s on Wet/Dry Lease basis from SBI, the terms of which can be mutually thrashed out.” Lohani has nominated Meenakshi Malik, Executive Director to take the discussion forward.