Gulf carriers such as Qatar Airways and Emirates have done an ”exceptional job” in serving the Indian market, and passengers have benefited from their presence, according to Willie Walsh, Director General of the global airlines body IATA. On October 9, 2020, then Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri had said that the time had come to send a loud and clear message that foreign airlines’ flights will not be allowed at the expense of Indian airlines. A significant number of international passengers from India use Gulf carriers like Emirates and Qatar Airways to travel to the US, Canada, and Europe. ”The Gulf carriers, in particular, have done an exceptional job, serving the Indian market,” Walsh, the head of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said in Boston last week. The consumers have benefited because they have connectivity in the Middle-Eastern hubs that Indian air carriers typically wouldn’t have had, he told PTI. The Indian government was looking to put in place certain systems to boost long-haul international flights of Indian carriers to places such as Europe and the US, Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia had said on September 30. ”If the view is that you need Indian carriers to serve that market, I don’t think you are going to get the same amount of choice (number of flights and number of cities connected), and certainly not in the short term,” Walsh said. ”Because serving India to North America directly is different to serving India over the Middle-Eastern hub into North America. The number of options (number of flights or number of cities connected) you have is significantly greater when you are going through one of the Middle-Eastern hubs,” Walsh said on the sidelines of the 77th annual general meeting of IATA, which took place in Boston. The Gulf carriers have traditionally served a very price-sensitive segment of the Indian market, he noted. ”They have been serving India to North America with relatively…