Qatar Airways flies to Hyderabad

Hyderabad, the fifth largest city of India and a growing IT hub, became the 37th destination for Qatar Airways which flew its inaugural flight from Doha to the city on November 22.

Akbar Al Baker, chief executive of Qatar Airways, said the flight - every Friday, Sunday and Wednesday - using recently acquired A 300 and A320 aircraft, will directly benefit Doha's 25,000 Telugu residents and give due recognition to Hyderabad's growing importance as a knowledge city.

He added that ideally he would have liked to have six flights a week to Hyderabad, but was restricted to carrying 500 passengers in each direction every week, under the agreement with the Indian Government.

The first batch of 116 passengers aboard a wide-bodied A-300 was given a reception, headed by the Indian Minister of State for Tourism, Srinivas Yadav.

The Hyderabad service is Qatar Airways' third Indian destination and its 37th international destination, which is in line with its rapid expansion policies to fly to around 50 destinations by the end of 2004.

In India alone, the airline operates six flights a week to Mumbai, seven to Thiruvananthapuram and now three a week to Hyderabad.

On its previous two sectors it has had a load factor exceeding 85 per cent and expects the Hyderabad sector to have a similar response.

The airline is all set to start flights to Kochi from March 1 and will also include Ahmedabad, Delhi and Chennai on its list in the near future, said Al Baker.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, Chandra Babu Naidu, expressed pleasure that this sector had been opened by Qatar Airways and expressed confidence that it would boost tourism and business traffic between the two countries.