The Conversation RONOJOY DUTTA

United Airlines, Air Canada, US Airways, and Air Sahara were Ronojoy Dutta’s stamping grounds, before taking over as chief executive officer of InterGlobe Aviation, which owns IndiGo, in January 2019. Since then, it hasn’t been clear blue skies for the 68-year-old: the airline’s promoters fought and Covid-19 stalled air travel. But Dutta now sees tailwinds emerging.

- ANSHUL DHAMIJA

THE COVID - 19 DISRUPTION

Is the Indian aviation industry staring at a crisis as Covid-19 shows no signs of abating just yet?

When we started flying in May 1 we were not sure what to expect. We had these various scenarios [in mind]. One was very optimistic: that there would be a vaccine soon and there would be a very quick recovery. There was [also] a very pessimistic scenario: where there would be a second or third wave [of the pandemic] and people’s confidence in flying would be shattered. Fortunately, we see recovery happening; we have passed the crisis stage. Part of the reason why [air] traffic in India has taken off is because people know air travel is safe. That customer confidence came back very quickly, and I have to thank both the government and our operations team for working so diligently on this by doing substantive things. We started with 25% of our pre-Covid-19 capacity and we have accelerated to 70%. That’s domestic. On the international front, because of the air bubbles and Vande Bharat flights, we are at about 20% of our pre-Covid-19 capacity. For domestic, we could get to 100% capacity by early 2021, while international is going to be a slower build-up.

What exactly was done to bring back customer confidence?