Fancy flights for Indian businessmen

In the past five years Indian industrialists have started taking to the air. The city of Mumbai now has 15 private jets. Second in line is Delhi with an almost equal number of private planes. Third and surprisingly, is Pune, where the Poonawala family keeps a fleet of aircrafts. The Bajajs have a fair share, and so do the Kirloskars and the Chabbrias of Finolex. In Bangalore and Chennai, Deccan Aviation (the low-cost carrier Air Deccan's subsidiary) has a stronghold, though it's largely helicopters that ply this region.
Among the bigger buyers of private planes is the Mukesh Ambani-run Reliance Industries. Mukesh already owns a Gulfstream IV and a Global Express according to the company spokesperson, regularly flies on a Mumbai-London non-stop route on the latter. Next in his shopping list is an Airbus corporate jet. Mukesh's younger brother Anil, who runs ADAG, is also on the lookout for aircraft for his group.
The Essar group, on its part, owns three planes. The Birlas, Mallya's United Breweries, the Sahara group, the Singhanias and ITC ? all are out shopping.
Five years back Captain S.K. Malik, who runs an air charter service Span Air, had drawn up plans to start a fractional ownership scheme. For a one-time investment of $110,000, he had 1/10th ownership of a helicopter on offer with 60 hours of flying time annually. 'I found not a single buyer,' he says. Today Malik prefers to concentrate on his air charter services business, waiting for delivery of a Hawker 850 that will primarily serve the Tata group.
Last year CluboneAir came into the picture and introduced a fullfledged scheme for fractional ownership. Run by Manav Singh, it today has a fleet of eight aircraft.
Saija Air, Fidelity Aviation and Forum One are all preparing for their launches.
07/12/06 Moneycontrol.com

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