A.P. Air Travellers’ Association wants State authorities to fill the revenue gap

After the SriLankan Airlines announced to withdraw the Colombo-bound flight services from city citing low occupancy as the reason, the AP Air Travellers’ Association representative have urged the government to fill the revenue gap through the Viability Gap Funding (VGF) route.

The flight services that was launched in July last year had registered an occupancy ranging between 55% and 60 % during the last 13 months, sources in the air travel industry said.

An average occupancy of 65% is needed for an airline to achieve the break-even which means the SriLankan Airlines is around 10 % short of the required figure.

It is learnt that the Odisha government has offered the SriLankan Airlines to fill the gap in revenue loss and sought operation of the flights from Bhubaneswar to Colombo.

“The Odisha government has agreed to fill the 10% gap through Viability Gap Funding (VGF) under International Udaan scheme and the airlines announced the withdrawal of the flight from Vizag,” sources said.

Blaming it on the government, the AP Air Travellers’ Association representatives have said that the State administration has to own the responsibility for failing to save the Vizag-Colombo flight.

“The government has failed in promoting the Buddhist heritage sites and other tourist attractions in the Visakhapatnam region. Its entire focus in on Amaravati only,” opined a tour operator from the city.

The return flight (Colombo – Vizag) had poor occupancy. The State government should have taken a cue from the Sri Lankan Tourism Promotion Board, which had organised road shows in Vizag and other cities in India to promote tourist attractions in Sri Lanka, said AP Air Travellers Association representative O. Naresh Kumar.

“The State government had offered VGF for two international flights from Vijayawada. Now, the same should be extended to SriLankan airlines,” he said.

Poor promotion

The Buddhist heritage sites in Visakhapatnam, North Andhra region and in other parts of Andhra Pradesh are not known even to the tourists from Northern India, leave alone foreign tourists, said Indian Association of Tour Operators (IATO) representatives from Delhi, Rajnish Kaistha and Lajpat Rai, during their visit to the city earlier this year.

“The number of enquiries from tourists about Ramayana package and casinos in Colombo saw a rise after the introduction of the Colombo flight. The government should organise roadshows in Sri Lanka to attract tourists,” said IATO member Ushapriya Kodali.