In an attempt to attract the value-conscious traveller, the West-Asian carrier Gulf Air is introducing its all-economy flight - Gulf Traveller - to the Indian circuit. The first of these flights have been deployed on the Bahrain-Thiruvananthpuram and Bahrain-Mumbai routes. Besides, talks are on with the Indian government to add similar flights on the Kochi sector. Gulf Air chief executive James Hogan said 'It's not a no-frills airlines.Its just a realisation that more people on these routes prefer to fly economy, beacuse of which the business and the first-class seats generally go empty. So, we decided not to block space and lose revenue. The fares of Gulf Traveller are on par with the fares of any other airline in the general economy-class on the route," Hogan added.

This shift in strategy, he feels, will help the airline achieve better margins and revenue from the Indian route."We are starting with a daily flight to Thiruvananthpuram with the Gulf Traveller and one flight on the Mumbai route", Hogan said. The airline also announced plans to start operations from Bangalore and Kolkata during winter, taking the total number of its destinations in India to seven. The twice-weekly Bangalore flight will start from October 26 and another twice-weekly service from Kolkata from November 25th.