New Delhi: As part of establishing synergy in operations, Air India (AI) and Indian Airlines (IA) have agreed to jointly operate 23 hub-and-spoke flights each week from major cities, including Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai.

As part of the agreement, IA would operate 23 flights on behalf of AI with A-320 aircraft between the three metros and Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Cochin, Bangalore and Trivandrum, an IA release said.

The flights would operate from international terminals and carry AI passengers from abroad directly to these points and vice versa.

Timings of these flights have been co-ordinated with AI flights leaving or arriving at Mumbai and Delhi. Passengers from these cities travelling on AI route network to New York, Chicago, London, Jeddah and Riyadh would be assured of seamless connection as a result of the agreement, he said.

While 17 of these flights would commence from October 27, six flights would start from early December.

IA was operating hub-and-spoke flights for AI since 1994 and at present the number of such flights was only four per week.

PTI