All Efforts Being Made To Ensure Air India's OTP: Mahesh Sharma

All possible efforts are being made to ensure the 'on time performance' of the flights of Air India, Union Minister Mahesh Sharma said.

In a written reply to the Rajya Sabha, the Minister of State for Civil Aviation said the On Time Performance (OTP) is being monitored at the highest level within Air India on a daily basis.

According to him, a video conference is anchored by Integrated Operation Control Centre (IOCC) everyday in which the representatives of operating departments from four regions participate to review the previous day's operation and evolve process improvement wherever possible.

Wherever required, issues are taken up with airport operators and ground handling agencies, among others, he added.

The state-owned carrier had delivered an OTP of 82.4 per cent in September.

According to the DGCA OTP data for September, the two other full service carriers, Jet Airways and Vistara, reported 87.4 and 94.2 per cent OTP respectively during the month.

Budget airlines IndiGo and SpiceJet flights took and landed on 92.4 per cent and 95.1 per cent on the scheduled time respectively.

The Aviation Ministry has asked Air India to make sure that at least 90 per cent of its flights, depart and land on time.

Air India's OTP is certainly better in October as against September. However, considering that Air India is a network carrier in the sense that it has more connecting flight than direct flights unlike some point-to-point carriers (who fly direct more), aircraft turnaround time also go up, which also impact OTP significantly.

Significantly, airline has average OTP from four metros; Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad.

IndiGo has 91.5 per cent OTP and 89 per cent by Jet Airways from these four airports in September, Air India's average OTP stood only at 81.9 per cent during the period.