Indian Airlines was a state-owned airline in India that later became a division of Air India Limited before ultimately ceasing operations. It was based in Delhi and focused primarily on domestic routes, along with several international services to neighbouring countries in Asia and limited flights to the Middle East and Southeast Asia. It was a division of Air India Limited after the merger of eight pre-Independence domestic airlines. On 10 December 2005, the airline was rebranded as Indian for advertising purposes as a part of a program to revamp its image in preparation for an initial public offering (IPO). The airline operated closely with Air India, India's national overseas carrier. Alliance Air was a fully owned subsidiary of Indian. In 2007, the Government of India announced that Indian Airlines would be merged into Air India Limited as its wholly owned subsidiary. As part of the merger process, a new company called the National Aviation Company of India Limited (now called Air India Limited) was established, into which both Air India (along with Air India Express) and Indian (along with Alliance Air) would be merged. Once the merger was completed on 26 February 2011, the airline – called Air India – would continue to be headquartered in Mumbai and would have a fleet of over 130 aircraft.

History

Merger of regional airlines

The airline was set up under the Air Corporations Act, 1953 with an initial capital of ₹32 million and started operations on 1 August 1953. It was established after legislation came into force to nationalise the entire airline industry in India. Two new national airlines were to be formed along the same lines as happened in the United Kingdom with British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) and British European Airways (BEA). Air India took over international routes and Indian Airlines Corporation (IAC) took over the domestic and regional routes. Eight pre-Independence domestic airlines, Deccan Airways, Airways India, Bharat Airways, Himalayan Aviation, Kalinga Airlines, Indian National Airways, Air Services of India and the domestic wing of Air India, were merged to form the new domestic national carrier Indian Airlines Corporation. International operations of Air India Ltd. was taken over by the newly formed Air India International. Indian Airlines Corporation inherited a fleet of 99 aircraft including 74 Douglas DC-3 Dakotas, 12 Vickers Vikings, 3 Douglas DC-4s and various smaller types from the seven airlines that made it up.

Early fleet

Vickers Viscounts were introduced in 1957 with Fokker F27 Friendships being delivered from 1961. The 1960s also saw Hawker Siddeley HS 748s, manufactured in India by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, join the fleet. The jet age began for IAC with the introduction of the pure-jet Sud Aviation Caravelle airliner in 1964, followed by Boeing 737-200s in the early 1970s. April 1976 saw the first three Airbus A300 wide-body jets being introduced. The regional airline, Vayudoot, which had been established in 1981, was later reintegrated. By 1988, Airbus A320-200s were introduced. The economic liberalisation process initiated by the Government of India in the early 1990s ended Indian Airlines' dominance of India's domestic air transport industry.

Post liberalisation

The Indian Government liberalised the private sector in Early 90s and with the emergence of new competitors, Indian Airlines faced tough competition from Jet Airways, Air Sahara, East-West Airlines, Skyline NEPC and ModiLuft. Yet, until 2005, Indian Airlines was the second-largest airline in India after Jet Airways while Air Sahara controlled 17% of the Indian aviation industry. During that time few other domestic carriers like East-West Airlines, Skyline NEPC and ModiLuft discontinued their flight operations. Also, during 1993, another government-established regional feeder airline called Vayudoot was merged with Indian Airlines, but still operated as a standalone division until 1997 after which its entire flight operations were transferred to Indian Airlines and its employees absorbed into Indian Airlines and Air India.

Low-cost carrier era

Since 2003, the rise of low-cost domestic competitors Air Deccan, SpiceJet, IndiGo, GoAir and Kingfisher Airlines along with its low-cost arm Kingfisher Red led Indian to reduce airfares. However, as of 2006, Indian Airlines was still a profit-making airline; in fact during 2004–2005 it made a record profit of ₹656.1 million. Indian Airlines Limited was partly owned by the Government of India (51% of share capital) through a holding company and had 19,300 employees as of March 2007. Its annual turnover, together with that of its subsidiary Alliance Air, was well over ₹40 billions (around US$1 billion). Together with its subsidiary, Alliance Air, Indian Airlines carried a total of over 7.5 million passengers annually.

Air India merger

In 2007, the Government of India announced the merger of Air India and Indian Airlines. While the "Indian" branding was replaced with the Air India branding in the public eye by then, the "IC" and "IAC" codes of IATA and ICAO, respectively, and callsign "INDAIR" continued to be used on flights that were operated by the Airbus A320 family aircraft until 26 February 2011, when Indian Airlines ceased operating under its own brand and codes and completed its merger with Air India. The last plane to bear the final Indian Airlines livery, an Airbus A319 registered as VT-SCF was repainted in the Air India livery in 2018.

Destinations

Codeshare agreements

Indian had codeshare agreements with the following airlines:

Fleet

As of 2007, Indian operated an all-Airbus fleet consisting of the A320 family.

Former fleet

Livery

The aircraft livery used while the company was called Indian Airlines was one of the longest in continuous use in the entire airline industry. The logo (IA) and the livery were designed by National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad. Its aircraft were mainly white, with the belly painted in light metallic grey. Above the windows, "Indian Airlines" was written in English on the starboard side and in Hindi on port side. The tail was bright orange, with its logo in white. In most of the aircraft, the logo was also painted on the engines over its bare metal colour. Also, when the company was under the title of Indian Airlines, to celebrate its 50th year of service the airline put the slogan "50 years of flying" in gold on many of their aircraft. After the name change to Indian, the company's aircraft sported a new look inspired by the Sun Temple at Konark in Odisha. The tail of their aircraft had a partial blue wheel since practically over half of it is cut off. The wheel is over an orange background with the carrier's name "Indian" written in English on one side of the fuselage, and in Hindi on the other. On 15 May 2007, the Government of India released the new merger livery, which was sent to Boeing in Seattle to repaint all the new fleet coming into the new Air India. Most of the old fleets of Air India and Indian Airlines have also been painted in the new livery.

Service

Indian operated short-haul Airbus A320 family aircraft. It offered 2 classes on most sectors: Economy Class and Executive Class. Economy Class had the typical 3-3 seating of a narrow-body Airbus aircraft. Passengers were offered complimentary meals. The Executive Class seat configuration was 2-2 with a generous recline. Meals were more lavish.

Incidents and accidents

1960s

1970s

1980s

1990s

Financials

Given below is a chart of trend of profitability of Indian Airlines as published in the 2004 annual report by Ministry of Civil Aviation with figures in millions of Indian Rupees.