The government of Gujarat has approached Air India (AI, Delhi International) and Jet Airways (JAI, Mumbai International) over their possible commencement of scheduled passenger services within the west Indian state.
The Times of India reports Air India has submitted a proposal which would see Alliance Air (India) (9I, Delhi International) operating its fleet of ATR72s on flights connecting Gujarat's Tier II cities which include: Ahmedabad; Bhavnagar; Surat; Rajkot; Jamnagar; and Vadodara. To ensure the services last well into the future, the Gujarati government is to subsidize the routes requested.
The announcement comes after two previous attempts at launching domestic services - in 2014 with Ventura AirConnect (Ahmedabad) and in 2015 with GSEC Aviation (Ahmedabad) and Mehair (Mumbai International) - failed to attract sufficient demand.
The Indian government last offered domestic intra-state services through its now defunct Vayudoot (Delhi Safdarjung) operation.