page_title: Indian Airlines
section_title: Post liberalisation
hierarchical_section_title: Indian Airlines / History / Post liberalisation
caption_attribution_description: Dornier Do.228 of Indian Airlines at New Delhi Indira Gandhi - DEL, India, 03/02/07.
context_page_description: Indian Airlines, later Indian, was a major Indian airline based in Delhi and focused primarily on domestic routes, along with several international services to neighbouring countries in Asia. It was state-owned after merger of eight pre-Independence domestic airlines and was administered by the Ministry of Civil Aviation. Indian was one of the two flag carriers of India, the other being Air India.
  On 7 December 2005, the airline was rebranded as Indian for advertising purposes as a part of a program to revamp its image in preparation for an initial public offering. The airline operated closely with Air India, India's national overseas carrier. Alliance Air was a fully owned subsidiary of Indian.
  In 2007, the Government of India announced that Indian would be merged into Air India. As part of the merger process, a new company called the National Aviation Company of India Limited was established, into which both Air India and Indian would be merged. Once the merger was completed, the airline – called Air India – would continue to be headquartered in Mumbai and would have a fleet of over 130 aircraft.
context_section_description: The Indian Government liberalised the private sector in mid 80s and with the emergence of new competitors, Indian Airlines faced tough competition from Jet Airways, Air Sahara, East-West Airlines, Skyline NEPC, and ModiLuft. Yet till 2005, Indian Airlines was the second-largest airline in India after Jet Airways while Air Sahara controlled 17% of the Indian aviation industry. During that time few other domestic carriers like East-West Airlines, Skyline NEPC and ModiLuft discontinued their flight operations.
  Also during 1993 another government-established regional feeder airline called Vayudoot was merged with Indian Airlines but still operated as a standalone division until 1997 after which its entire flight operations were transferred to Indian Airlines and its employees absorbed into Indian Airlines and Air India.
caption: Till the advent of low-cost carriers Indian Airlines operated a fleet of Dornier 228 for smaller destinations
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