Demand for private jets, helicopters likely to rise up to 40 pc during LS polls

As political parties prepare to fight it out in the Lok Sabha polls the demand for chartered planes and helicopters is expected to jump by up to 40 per cent compared to the previous general elections according to industry experts Helicopters are anticipated to be more in demand compared to fixedwing aircraft as choppers will help in providing accessibility to rural and remote areas in a shorter timeThere will be an exponential demand for private jets and the demand is expected to outstrip the availability of chartered planes and helicopters There is a limited supply of chartered planes and helicopters Club One Air CEO Rajan Mehra told PTI With increased demand some players will be taking chartered planes and helicopters on lease during the general elections for which the dates are expected to be announced in the coming daysChartered plane and helicopter services are charged on an hourly basis The industry experts opined that the prices can vary between Rs 45 lakh to Rs 525 lakh per hour for a chartered plane For a helicopter the hourly charge will be around Rs 15 lakh Business Aircraft Operators Association BAOA Managing Director Captain R K Bali told PTI that during the Lok Sabha polls the demand for private chartered planes and helicopters is expected to increase by 30 to 40 per cent compared to the previous electionsOfficial data showed that there were 112 NonScheduled Operators NSOPs at the end of December 2023 Generally NSOPs are entities that do not have a particular fixed schedule and fly when there is a requirement Since the demand will be high players are expected to take planes on lease for chartered operations especially helicopters Bali said and added that there are around 111112 NSOPs and out of them 4050 per cent operate single aircraftHe said that NSOPs are estimated to have around 450 planes including choppers These operators have aircraft and helicopters with seating capacities varying from 3 to 37 The planes include Falcon 2000 Bombardier Global 5000 Twin Otter DHC6300 Hawker Beechcraft Gulfstream G200 and Cessna Citation 560XL as per the data available with the Directorate General of Civil Aviation DGCAMost of the aircraft and helicopters have seating capacities of less than 10 the data showed Mehra said the size of the chartered fleet will be around 350 and out of them about 175 are helicopters A chartered operator Club One has a fleet of 5 Falcon 2000 4 Cessna Citation and 1 Bombardier CRJ200 Political leaders will opt for helicopters to travel to small towns and hence more demand is likely for the choppers Mehra said There are several brokers in the segment and sometimes they book a specific number of hours for a chartered plane and later those hours are sold to the end users including political parties Mehra saidBali said there are a lot of brokers providing chartered plane services and the hourly pricing will also depend on the negotiations and generally hours are booked in bulk Membership of BAOA is voluntary An executive who has been in the chartered aircraft services business for more than two decades also said there is a huge demand this time and some players are taking aircraft and helicopters on lease for their clientsOn the condition of anonymity the executive also claimed that the hourly rates for helicopters for the upcoming elections have gone up significantly While chartered helicopters are hired at a rate of around Rs 15 lakh per hour In some cases the hourly rates are even touching Rs 35 lakh the executive added Broadly Mehra said the price can range between Rs 45 lakh to Rs 525 lakh per hour for a chartered aircraftThe ruling BJP incurred expenses totalling more than Rs 250 crore on aircraft helicopters as per the partys annual audited accounts for 201920 submitted to the Election Commission of India ECI The amount shelled out by the Congress party towards election travelling expenses in 201920 stood at over Rs 126 crore The party did not mention aircrafthelicopter expenses separately in its annual audited accounts for that financial yearThe last Lok Sabha elections were held in April and May of 2019 According to veteran elections analyst N Bhaskara Rao the total expenditure during the upcoming Lok Sabha polls is expected to be around Rs 120 lakh crore 2024 Lok Sabha poll expenditure alone will involve around one lakh twenty thousand crores of this Election Commission of India ECI is estimated to spend hardly twenty per cent expenditure on new EVMs is not included he said He also said the price for hiring a chartered plane has almost remained steady since the pandemic and the players in the segment do not tend to outprice each otherSince the coronavirus pandemic the demand for private charters has remained steady especially with people looking mainly for hygiene and safety factorsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data 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