Qantas continues Indian expansion with Sydney-Bangalore flights

Qantas will become the first airline to offer non-stop flights between Sydney and Bangalore – also known as Bengaluru – in a move which builds upon the carrier’s recent expansion to New Delhi.

The launch schedule sees four return flights a week (Saturday, Sunday, Wednesday and Friday) beginning from September 14 on the Qantas Airbus A330, with the new route effectively slotting in place of the seasonal Sydney-Delhi service which finished its debut run at the end of March.

The airline claims the 13 million-strong population of the growing technology and financial services hub “has strong connections to Australia for both business travel and people visiting friends and relatives. These trade connections are expected to strengthen following the recent announcement of the Australia-India free trade agreement.”

But it won’t just be about that 12-hour trip to Bangalore: Qantas will partner with IndiGo, India’s largest domestic carrier, to give travellers “improved one-stop access to more than 50 Indian cities.”

The proposed codeshare agreement will mean Qantas passengers can transit seamlessly from Qantas flights in Bengaluru, Delhi or even Singapore onto IndiGo services to other major Indian cities, as well as smaller ones such as Pune and Goa.

Qantas Frequent Flyers will be able to earn and redeem points on connecting IndiGo flights which carry a QF code, while IndiGo will recognise Qantas Frequent Flyer benefits for Silver, Gold, Platinum and Platinum One members including priority check-in, additional baggage allowance and priority baggage.

“Our new direct flights to Bengaluru, combined with the planned codeshare with IndiGo, have the potential to reshape the way many people travel between Australia and India” predicts Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce.

Joyce also cited the signing of the Australia-India free trade agreement as “a driver of travel demand as trade and investment links expand between Australia and India’s population of more than one billion people.”

Tickets for the Sydney-Bengaluru flights are on sale today, while the first three return services between Sydney and Bengaluru will also be ‘Points Planes’ where frequent flyers can use Qantas Points to book any seat as a Classic Reward Seat until the end of April 2022, at 37,600 points for a one-way economy booking and 94,900 points in business class.