Lufthansa said its ability to serve India was “unnecessarily limited”.
Deutsche Lufthansa AG’s decision to cut flights to India following a clash over coronavirus travel restrictions illustrates how difficult it is to bring back intercontinental flights.
Europe’s largest airline said on Tuesday it was operating 23 weekly flights for the next three weeks after India’s Civil Aviation Authority refused to sign the schedule. He complained that Germany had imposed more stringent entry restrictions leading to an “unfair distribution of traffic”.
The falling out, which shatters an agreement that has been in place for several months, shows how frustrated attempts to reopen international routes are at parallel efforts to stop the spread of the virus. Germany has one of the lowest Covid-19 death rates in Europe, while India has the highest infection total after the United States.
“Air bubbles only work when implemented between countries with similar infection levels,” said Mark D Martin of Martin Consulting. “We cannot expect Germany to make concessions at a time when infection rates are climbing and there is no flattening of the curve in India.”
An Indian suggestion that Lufthansa operates seven weekly services, closer to the three or four operated by Indian carriers, has been rejected by the German airline, DGCA chief Arun Kumar said.
Concerns surround German restrictions on the entry of holders of certain types of visas, according to a spokesperson for the agency, Kumar said.
Martin said India was also reluctant to allow Lufthansa to add partner airline codes to its flights, which would increase the reach of ticket sales.
Under the existing plan, Lufthansa was allowed to operate 20 weekly flights through September, with its now obsolete plan for October to add the city of Chennai to the existing destinations of New Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru.
Lufthansa said its ability to serve India was “unnecessarily limited” and that a new agreement between governments was urgently needed.
(Except for the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
