Billionaire investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala-promoted airline venture Akasa Air has received the no-objection certificate (NOC) from the Civil Aviation Ministry and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and now aims to commence flight operations by the end of 2021, CNBC-TV18 has learnt.

The upcoming airline has been in the works since the end of 2020 and former Chief Executive Officer of Jet Airways and GoAir, Vinay Dube, is expected to play a key role in the airline. CNBC-TV18 had exclusively reported in March 2021 that Dube plans to start a domestic airline in 2021 with five aircraft initially.

Akasa Air is expected to be based in Bengaluru and it plans to have a route network close to the city such as Bengaluru-Mumbai, Bengaluru-Chennai, Bengaluru-Hyderabad, among others, sources said.

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(Edited by : Bivekananda Biswas)