OREANDA-NEWS. October 3, 2011. Holiday makers travelling with Air India have one more reason to cheer. Air India has introduced, from today, a direct flight between Delhi and Port Blair, with a stopover at Bhubaneswar.

The flight AI 9603 / 9604 to be operated with CRJ-700, 70 seater aircraft, will operate on all days of the week except Saturday. The flight will take off from Delhi at 0520 hrs to land at Bhubaneswar at 0730 hrs and will take at 0800 hrs and arrive at Port Blair at 0935 hrs. The return flight will leave Port Blair at 1005 hrs and reach Bhubaneswar at 1140 hrs. It will take off from Bhubaneswar at 1210 hrs and arrive back in Delhi at 1420 hrs. 

In addition to this Air India is increasing capacity on the Delhi – Guwahati sector with the introduction of AI 9611 / 9612. The flight, also to be operated with a CRJ-700 aircraft will operate Monday to Saturday, six days a week. 

The Guwahati flight will take off from Delhi at 1500 hrs and reach Guwahati at 1715 hrs, leave Guwahati at 1745 hrs to reach back Delhi at 2000 hrs. 

The flights are expected to give good connectivity to passengers arriving from northern and western India or arriving from abroad and travelling to Port Blair and Guwahati. The flights will be operated by Alliance Air, a subsidiary of Air India and will facilitate direct air travel between the destinations. 

Conveniently timed and oriented towards catering to the increasing demand from the Capital to the Eastern region, the afternoon flight on the Delhi-Guwahati-Delhi route will cater to day return traffic on this route. 

A variety of fares are available on the new service, including special promotional fares and fares to stimulate LTC travel. It is expected that flights between Delhi and Port Blair will meet the long standing requirement for more seamless connectivity between the national Capital and the Andamans. So far passengers could travel to Port Blair from Kolkata and Chennai only.