Air India marks 70 yrs since 1st India-UK flight

Representational picture

Air India is marking 70 years since its first flight took off from Mumbai to London in June 1948, which laid the foundations of the India-UK relationship. The national carrier is inviting members of the Indian diaspora in Britain to share their memories of the airline in its early days. The iconic first flight, on a Super Constellation aircraft, took off from Mumbai on June 8 and landed in London via Cairo and Geneva on June 10, 1948, with just 42 passengers on board, including some Indian 'Nawabs' (noblemen) and 'Maharajas' (kings).

Later this month, Air India is preparing to mark the historic journey, which laid the foundations of the India-UK relationship 70 years ago. "We want to reach out to people who would have made some of these early journeys to share their memories and pictures, which we could feature in our inflight magazine and also catalogue to mark those glorious early days of air travel," said Debashis Golder, Air India Regional Manager - UK and Europe.