UAE-Indian flights: Dubai-based businessman aims to launch Air Kerala for expats

UAE-Indian flights: Dubai-based businessman aims to launch Air Kerala for expats

Aimed to provide respite to Keralites living in the country from sky-high ticket prices and a shortage of flight seats, Air Kerala has been shelved several times

Supplied photo

A Dubai-based businessman is trying to revive an airline for expats from the Southern-Indian state of Kerala. Afi Ahmed, Founder of Smart Travels, said he is exploring multiple ways to make the project Air Kerala a reality. Last month, the entrepreneur paid another local company a whopping Dh1 million for the domain name airkerala.com.

“I was looking for a domain for my B2C project,” he said, speaking to Khaleej Times. “I wanted to launch an aggregator website, and I was looking for a catchy name when I saw that airkerala.com was available for purchase. I was shocked, because Air Kerala is a project that was announced by the Kerala government in 2005, and has been a hot topic among Keralites all over the world for almost two decades.”

A proposed airline by the Government of Kerala, Air Kerala was registered as a fully owned subsidiary of Cochin International Airport Limited (CIAL) in 2006. Aimed to provide respite to Keralites living in the UAE from sky-high ticket prices and a shortage of flight seats, Air Kerala