Jet Airways Suspends Operations On 13 More International Routes Till April-End 

Mired in serious financial turmoil, Naresh Goyal-led Jet Airways suspended operations on as many as 13 more international routes till April-end, while also grounding seven more planes due to non-payment of rentals, two of which used to fly under JetLite banner, reports Indian Express.

Jet Airways has now reduced its operations to one-fourth from over 600 daily flights earlier, with just one-third of its 119 fleet being operational. The company said that it is actively engaging with the lessors and is regularly providing updates to the lessors about the efforts being undertaken to address the liquidity crunch.

This new round of operations curtailment comes at the backdrop of the airline already having reduced the frequencies of its flights on seven other international routes, mostly out of Delhi and Mumbai.

Earlier, the routes where services were temporarily withdrawn, included Mumbai-Manchester route, Pune-Abu Dhabi route (seven flights weekly) and also Pune-Singapore route with seven flights a week, which was launched just bygone December (2018) with much celebration.

The flights which have been suspended from Delhi till April-end include Delhi-Abu Dhabi (nine weekly), Dammam (14 weekly), Dhaka (11 weekly), Hong Kong and Riyadh (seven each weekly), said the airline source. Among flights from Mumbai, the routes suspended till 30 April include services to Abu Dhabi (12 weekly), Bahrain (4-7 weekly), Hong Kong (7 weekly) and Dammam (14 weekly).

Similarly, services on the Bangalore-Singapore and Kolkata-Dhaka route have also been suspended for the same period, while flights from Delhi and Mumbai to overseas destinations like Kathmandu, Bangkok, Doha, Kuwait and Singapore have been also been pared down significantly.

The Jet Airways administration in involved in rigorous negotiations with equity partner Etihad Airways and major lenders including State Bank of India (SBI) to dissipate the financial crunch of the fledgling airline.