"For the first time in the country, a small aircraft in the form of an air taxi is being used for services," Khattar said at the inauguration of the services from Chandigarh Airport.
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The air commuter service will be operated by Air Taxi India, which in December 2020 got a clearance permit from the aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) for operating as a Scheduled Commuter Airline.
The company in second phase plans to start services for Hisar to Dehradun from January 18. In the third phase, two more routes from Chandigarh to Dehradun and Hisar to Dharamshala will be added on January 23. The company also plans to include Shimla, Kullu and more Haryana routes in further development of the Air Taxi Services.
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According to regional air commuter’s co-founder Varun Suhag, Air Taxi India received its permit on December 14. Suhag said the airline has a total of 26 routes in the regional connectivity scheme (RCS) UDAN.
The launch of India’s first air taxi comes in sync with UDAN RCS which aims to fulfill the government's objective to provide air connectivity with metros to the Tier-2 & Tier-3 cities of the country. As part of the scheme, the government gives per seat subsidy to air carriers to connect small towns with cities.
According to reports, the AirTaxi will be using a fleet of a twin-engine four-seat Tecnam P2006T aircraft, which is manufactured by Italy based Costruzioni Aeronautiche Tecnam.
Under the UDAN RCS scheme, as many as 300 routes have been operationalized and the inauguration marks the start of the 303rd route.