Aviation minister flags off first commercial passenger flight to Bareilly airport from Delhi

The first commercial passenger flight to Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh operated by an all-woman crew was flagged off from the Delhi airport by Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Monday. "The Bareilly airport has been upgraded for commercial flight operations under the regional connectivity scheme - Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik (RCS-UDAN) of the government of India," the civil aviation ministry said in a statement.

The all-woman crew operated Alliance Air's Delhi-Bareilly inaugural flight on International Women's Day, it said.

Alliance Air will be deploying its ATR 72-600 aircraft, which can seat around 70 passengers, on the Delhi-Bareilly route, the statement said.


Till now, the Bareilly airport did not handle commercial flight operations and was exclusively an airbase of the Indian Air Force (IAF).

The IAF handed over the land to the Airports Authority of India (AAI) a couple of years back to construct infrastructure for commercial flight operations. Now the airport will handle both IAF and commercial operations.

Under the UDAN scheme, financial incentives from the Centre, state government and airport operators are extended to selected airlines to encourage operations from unserved and under-served airports, and keep airfares affordable.