Because of the fare factor despite frequent delays, spiceJet’s Pune-Dubai flight was popular among flyers.
“IndiGo’s one-way fare from Pune was Rs24,000. We found many direct flights from Mumbai with fares Rs15,000-18,000 per person and booked one,” he said. Launched in 2015, the SpiceJet Pune-Dubai flight’s fare used to be Rs13,000-14,000 per person. Flight-tracking website Flightradar indicated that the service was suspended over 10 days ago. Travel portals showed bookings resuming from Oct 17. The suspended flight was scheduled to depart from Pune at 21.00 IST and reach Dubai at 00.25 IST. The return flight, SG-52, would take off from Dubai at 01.35 IST and land in Pune at 04.30 IST.
Because of operational reasons and would resume in mid-October, confirming the suspension of Pune-Dubai service, a SpiceJet spokesperson told TOI that the flight SG-51 was temporarily unavailable. Because of the fare factor despite frequent delays, sometimes running into several hours, “The SpiceJet flight remained popular among flyers.
We have been told that the service would resume soon,” a Pune airport official said. Pune: Flyers seeking pocket-friendly direct flight deals to Dubai are taking the Mumbai route after SpiceJet temporarily suspended its service from Pune to the United Arab Emirates city, pushing up fares of a couple of other carriers operating in the sector. Kondhwa Khurd’s Shafiq Ashraf Sheikh, an autorickshaw driver, recently booked a Mumbai-Dubai flight for his brother after finding fares from Pune unaffordable. Pune has two other direct services to the UAE — IndiGo ’s daily flight to Dubai and Air India Express’s Abu Dhabi service thrice a week.