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Ashwini Phadnis

With budget airlines offering lower than ever fares to West Asia, Indian travellers could now consider weekend shopping at the duty-free arcade at Sheikh Rashid terminal in Dubai.

THE Indian traveller will soon have the luxury of choosing the fares he pays for travelling abroad.

The arrival of at least two low-cost airlines — Air Arabia, that will start daily flights between Mumbai and Sharjah from March 26, and Air India (AI) Express, Air India's budget airline being launched — could change things in the market place.

Air Arabia, the low cost airline of Sharjah, has announced an introductory one-way fare of Rs 2,999 for the Sharjah-Mumbai sector which will be valid at least till mid-May.

Also, the airline is offering a one-way fare of Rs 5,242 to Kuwait and Rs 4,941 to Bahrain.

Apart from targeting people travelling to the Gulf for work, the airline is planning to woo leisure travellers to take off to destinations such as Alexandria in Egypt, to which Air Arabia has regular flights.

" Our strategy is to create leisure where none exists," said Mr Rohit Ramachandran, the India Manager of Air Arabia. As part of the strategy, the airline is offering a return airfare of about Rs 16,000 to Alexandria.

The regular fares on offer by the airline are less than those charged by conventional airlines operating in the Gulf .

AI Express is looking at offering tickets at rates that would work out about 25 per cent cheaper than what is charged by conventional airlines in the market.

The airline plans to operate not only to various cities in the Gulf and West Asia , including Dubai, Muscat, Salalah, Bahrain, Doha and Kuwait, but also popular holiday destinations in the Far East such as Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore.

And just as there are full service airlines from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) such as Emirates and Etihad, to India, Air India and AI Express will operate to some destinations in the Gulf, including Dubai, and the Far East.

However, unlike other global low-cost airlines, AI Express will offer a "moderate but decent meal" free of charge to passengers.

This will be in contrast to most other low-cost airlines that charge for anything served to the passengers.

The airline is said to start operations with three leased Boeing 737 aircraft, even as it is moving ahead with the process to acquire 18 such aircraft.

The airline is hopeful that acquisition of the aircraft will start in the latter half of 2006.

However, unlike AI Express, Air Arabia has a fleet of five Airbus A-320 aircraft. And while the AI Express aircraft will have 181 seats, the Air Arabia aircraft will have 150 .

In order to cut operating costs both the airlines are looking at operating to destinations which are about four or five hours away from the home country.

While these two low-cost airlines have already announced plans, there are several others including the Malaysian airline, Air Asia, which are keen on starting regular flights to and from India.

With fierce competition among conventional airlines already pushing down the cost of air travel (a return ticket to London is now available for as little as Rs 19,990), it would seem that things could only get better for the international air traveller in the days to come.

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