Aviation

Malaysian Airlines considers domestic interline partner

Preeti Kannan - Chennai

Malaysian Airlines is rationalising its routes internationally, including India and is toying with the idea of a tie-up with a Indian domestic carrier to ferry passengers from the B cities to metros from where they operate direct flights to Kuala Lumpur. The airline recently closed down the Ahmedabad and Kolkata routes because of low yield. Speaking to ETW, Tajul Ariffin Kamat, area manager, Malaysian Airlines, said, "We are maintaining profitable routes and cutting losses by closing routes that are not doing well. We are also considering a tie-up with a domestic airline in India but have not finalised anything yet." Malaysian Airlines is currently focusing on the southern cities of India, apart from the metros of Mumbai and Delhi, which have higher volume of traffic. From 33 flights a week from India to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian Airlines has brought it down to 27 flights. Earlier, the airline used to fly to seven cities and now it has restricted its span of operations to daily flights from Chennai, Mumbai and Delhi and thrice a week from Bangalore and Hyderabad. Besides India, Malaysian Airlines has terminated flights to other cities like Manchester and Padang (Sumatra) and has stopped flying to Vienna from last month.