New Delhi: IndiGo Monday announced the launch of flights to seven new international destinations by March 2025, taking the total number of international destinations served by the airline to over 40.
The low-cost airline, India’s largest, also said that its business class offering ‘IndiGo Stretch’ will be open for booking on the Delhi-Mumbai route from Tuesday (6 August) at prices starting from Rs 18,018. However, actual travel will start in mid-November.
Speaking at the airline’s 18th-anniversary celebration event in New Delhi, CEO Peter Elbers said this will be followed by a gradual scale-up of its business class operation. The product will be offered on most of the metro-to-metro routes, with all 12 routes expected to be served by the end of 2025, he said.
IndiGo co-founder Rahul Bhatia, speaking at the event, tried to allay stakeholder fears in light of his June sale of 2 percent stake in InterGlobe Aviation Ltd, the parent company of IndiGo, in a block trade in a deal size estimated at over Rs 3,360 crore. He said InterGlobe Enterprises are committed to the airline.
He reiterated that the stakes were sold to raise funds for other business ventures for InterGlobe as well as for general corporate purposes. “InterGlobe and I are here to stay,” an emotional Bhatia said at the event.
Elbers added that since its inception in 2006, the airline has served more than 600 million travellers, and now operates on around 400 domestic routes. The company currently serves 34 international destinations, and, Elbers announced, it will be adding seven new international destinations by the end of this year, bringing the total number of international destinations served to over 40.
Currently, IndiGo operates more than 2,000 flights daily.
The company said its business class will be a coupe-style, two-seat wide bay. It will provide premium seats with a pitch (the distance between seats on a plane), of 38 inches and a width of 21.3 inches.
The airline also announced its much-awaited loyalty programme — IndiGo BluChip. Members of the programme will be able to collect ‘IndiGo BluChips’ on every IndiGo flight based on their spend, the company said.
(Edited by Sanya Mathur)