SHILLONG, Feb 16: FlyBig, the Indore-based airline company has announced resumption of its New Delhi-Shillong flight service from March 4 and is accepting bookings on popular travel site MakeMyTrip. The services are set to resume after remaining grounded for several weeks.
Curiously, the company has opened bookings for Shillong-Delhi flights from March 4 despite not having any approval from the Director General of Civil Aviation, an official source told The Shillong Times.
The official also revealed that flight schedule announced by FlyBig on MakeMyTrip does not come under the watch hours of the Shillong Airport, meaning the airport does not operate at that particular time.
The official also said that FlyBig recently asked the authorities of Shillong Airport to provide an office space to the company as they intend to start the services in March. The Airport has asked the company to produce documents like approval of schedule from DGCA and other queries like whether flights will be operated under Regional Connectivity Scheme (UDAN) or normally, documents of the MoU signed with the Meghalaya Transport Department and details of the type and availability of the aircraft but FlyBig is yet to respond to the queries.
As per the MoU, FlyBig was scheduled to operate around 160 flights per year between Shillong and New Delhi but the company grounded its operations after less than 20 flights with an aircraft procured from SpiceJet on wet lease.
The airline, promoted by Gurugram-based Big Charter Private Limited, operated its first flight on the Delhi-Shillong route in December 2020 but was unable to keep its services in the air for long, leading to much embarrassment for the state government which had entered into an agreement with the company under the Viability Gap Funding (VGF) mode.
