Air India
Air India Airbus A310.
Air India is one of India's two state owned airlines, the other being Indian Airlines. Its IATA designator is AI. It operates out of international airports in India, including from Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai, India, Chennai International Airport in Chennai, India and Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi, India.
It was founded by J. R. D. Tata in 1932 as Tata Airlines. In 1933, the first full year of its operations, Tata Airlines flew 160,000 miles, carried 155 passengers and 10.71 tonnes of mail. Tata Airlines was converted into a Public Company under the name of Air-India in August 1946.
In 1947, Air India signed an agreement with the Government of India to operate international services under the name Air India International. On March 8, 1948, Air India International was incorporated. 3 months later on June 8, Air India International inaugurated its international services with a weekly flight from Bombay to London via Cairo and Geneva. On January 21, 1950, Air India inaugurated a fortnightly Bombay-Nairobi service via Aden.
Air India was nationalized in 1953.
In 1960, Air India (International) flights entered USA for the first time starting with flights to New York. In 1962, the word 'international' was dropped.
Air India Flight 855 crashed into the Arabian Sea after takeoff from Sahar International Airport (now Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Bombay (now Mumbai) on 1 January 1978, killing everyone on board.
Air India Flight 182 was blown up by Sikh nationalists on 23 June 1985. It was on its second leg on its Toronto-Montreal-London-Delhi-Bombay (Mumbai) flight when it exploded off the coast of Ireland. Everyone on board died.
On October 11, 1990, Air India completed evacuation of stranded Indian nationals from the Gulf. Air India, in association with Indian Airlines, Indian Air Force and Aeroflot, operated 488 special flights to airlift 1,11,711 stranded Indian nationals. With such a large number of people having never been airlifted earlier, Air India added a new chapter in the annals of World Civil Aviation history. The 59-day epoch making evacuation earned rich accolades for Air-India.
In 1996, Air India started services to Chicago, USA followed by services to New Jersey, USA in 2002. In 2004, it has declared its intention to start services to Los Angeles, USA after June.
On January 31, 2001, Air India's security department became the first aviation security organisation in the world to acquire ISO 9002-1994 certification.
In recent years there have been talks about re-privatizing Air India.
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