Air Deccan anniversary bonanza, tickets at Rs 3

Bangalore, Aug 22: Low Cost Airliner, Air Deccan is celebrating its third anniversary in a novel way offering three lakh tickets at Rs three.

The ''3 for 3'' offer opening tomorrow would hold good for the months of November and December and January next year. Passengers would have to pay Rs three, besides the necessary tax and surcharge, Air Deccan said in a release here today.

Air Deccan Managing Director Capt G R Gopinath said in the release ''these special offers are part of our strategy to encourage and enable more people especially non-air travellers to take to the skies.

''From one aircraft and four flights a day three years ago, we have today grown to a reliable and efficient airline flying 270 flights a day connecting the widest network of 55 destinations across India. With a current fleet of 36 brand new aircraft we have flown a whopping figure of 6.2 million passengers till date and the numbers are growing everyday,'' he added.

Capt Gopinath said the major concern for passengers had been on-time performance. ''We are working tooth and nail to ensure that our flights are not delayed and over the last few weeks there has been marked improvement. Air Deccan has recorded an on-time performance of 98.42 per cent in July 2006 and we will make sure that we perform consistently. Passengers too are writing to us about the perceptible change in our on-time performance,'' he added.

Air Deccan also announced that bookings on all its ATR (short haul) sectors would open tomorrow between October 30 and January 31.

UNI