The day after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was sworn in for a second term on May 30, the government has removed all temporary restrictions in Indian airspace enforced since February 27.
The Indian Air Force (IAF) tweeted on the evening of May 31: "Temporary restrictions on all air routes in the Indian airspace, imposed by the Indian Air Force on 27 Feb 19, have been removed."
The move was a gesture to Pakistan to open up its own airspace for overflights and shorten journey times between much of South and South East Asia and the west, "highly placed sources" told The Economic Times.
"Armed with this magnanimous decision of the Modi-II government [...] foreign airlines can now approach the UN's aviation arm ICAO and the global airline forum of IATA to put pressure on Pakistan to lift the restrictions," one of the sources said.
On May 29, a spokesperson for Pakistan’s Civil Aviation Authority told Reuters that Pakistani airspace on its eastern border with India would remain closed until June 14. However, on June 1, Pakistan indicated that it may lift its ban to reciprocate India’s decision.
Since the ban was imposed during a tense military standoff between the two countries, rerouting has meant an extra hour for flight times between Delhi International and Dubai International, for example, and an additional 90 minutes from Delhi to Europe. Up to three hours have been added to Air India's flights between Delhi and the US east coast, which now need a fuelling stop.
IndiGo Airlines's new Delhi International-Istanbul Airport service, announced in January and launched on March 20 with an A321-200neo, has been forced to make a fuelling stop en-route.
