High Commissioner Moragoda and IndiGo founder Rahul Bhatia discuss aviation collaboration

High Commissioner Milinda Moragoda met with Rahul Bhatia, Founder and Managing Director of IndiGo. They discussed ways to expand collaboration in the aviation sector between Sri Lanka and India including ways and means to make Sri Lankan airports more competitive for Indian carriers. The opportunities presented by the recent permission granted by the Reserve Bank of India to allow VOSTRO accounts were also discussed.

IndiGo is India’s largest airline by passenger carriage and fleet size, and is a pioneer in low-cost aviation in India. The airline has carried over 300 million passengers as of November 2022.

IndiGo currently operates scheduled flights between Chennai and Colombo, and is responsible for transporting a significant portion of tourism traffic from India, Sri Lanka’s largest source market. Tourism from India will play a central role in Sri Lanka’s economic recovery. The recent approval by the Reserve Bank of India to allow VOSTRO accounts to be opened by Sri Lankan banks is a first step towards enhancing rupee-based trade between India and Sri Lanka. This development will be a further catalyst in enhancing tourism and IndiGo will play a key role in this regard.