Indian aviation to have 2,000 planes in short to medium term: Hardeep Puri

Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Tuesday said the number of planes will increase to 2,000 in short to medium term from 540 aircraft when Jet Airways discontinued operations.

Crisis-hit Jet Airways stopped flying on April 17 this year and subsequently, its lenders on June 17 moved the NCLT. Speaking at the CII-CBRE real estate conference, the Minister said there are very few companies running airlines globally making money in the aviation sector, possibly due to wrong business model and corporate governance issues, or both.

“When jet airways stopped operation we had 540 planes in the air, today we have 690 planes in the air and we are in short to medium term looking something close to 2,000 planes in the air if we look at the order book of Indian aviation companies,” he said.