Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapati Raju Pusapati Saturday reviewed the performance of national carrier Air India, and was apprised about the progress made in the field of revenues, reduction of cost, customer services and social media.

 

 

 According the airline, the minister asked that the further efforts should be made to achieve the turnaround at the earliest.

 

 Raju emphasised the need to continue focus on passenger handling, punctuality, team work and sensitivity to customer needs.

 

 He further said that constant efforts are required to ensure that the rich benefits earned by entering into Star Alliance should be sustained.

 

 Minister of State for Civil Aviation Mahesh Sharma had earlier this week told parliament that the national carrier has been involved with route rationalisation for stopping operations on loss making routes.

 

 Air India has been phasing out old fleet, which in turn will lead to reduced maintenance costs, he had said.

 

 Other cost cutting measures included closure of overseas offline offices and the introduction of a passenger service system for a single code.

 

 Air India is likely to incur losses up to Rs.5,000 crore has an accumulated debt burden of Rs.40,000 crore.

 

 It received a fresh equity infusion of Rs.5,000 crore in the interim budget for 2014-15.

 

 The cash-strapped carrier will be provided around Rs.20,000 crore till 2020-2021 to turn around its operational and financial performance.