Bengaluru's much talked about air taxi grabs attention at Invest Karnataka-2025 summit
Bengaluru, Feb 13 (PTI): Sarla Aviation's futuristic looking air taxi may have been drowned in a sea of aircraft at the Aero Show, but at Invest Karnataka-2025 summit, the prototype 'Shunya' clearly is the star, with people milling around it for more information and selfies.
Not even halfway through day two of the much-awaited event of Bengaluru, Dinesh, one of the founders of Sarla Aviation, was nursing a sore throat after answering a barrage of questions from curious onlookers.
"I ran out of cards too," Dinesh told PTI.
Incidentally, when the news of the air taxi hit the town in October last year, it became the subject of 'Peak Bengaluru' memes as it was announced that a trip to airport from Electronic City will only take 19 minutes and Rs 900. By road, on a good day, it would take about two hours. The pricing too sounded unbelievable to many Bengalureans who had to shell out at least Rs 1,000 for a trip to airport by cab.
Dinesh said the company is yet to get clearance from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
"Once that is done, we could commission the two aircraft in our fleet immediately," he said.
He estimated that it would require about 18 months to get the clearances in place.
The unmanned aircraft is expected to ferry six passengers at a time, said Dinesh, adding that it can carry a maximum load of 680 kg with speeds reaching up to 250 km/hour. It requires only a cleared area of 2000 sq ft to land or take off, he said.
According to him, the company is looking to add four more aircraft by this year. "It will be optimised for short trips of 20-30 km aimed to reduce travel times across congested urban areas," said Dinesh.
At Invest Karnataka-2025 summit, on till February 14 at Bangalore Palace, air taxi is a static display while in Aero India 2025, also on till February 14 at Yelahanka Air Force base, it is being flown to show people how it works.
The three day event that was inaugurated by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh will conclude on Friday.
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US VP JD Vance says Lebanon not part of ceasefire, calls it ‘misunderstanding’
Budapest/Washington: US Vice President J D Vance has said that Lebanon was never included in the ceasefire understanding with Iran, describing the confusion as a “legitimate misunderstanding”.
Speaking to reporters before departing from Hungary, Vance said, “I think the Iranians thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon and it just didn’t. We never made that promise.”
He stressed that the United States had not included Lebanon in the scope of the ceasefire at any stage.
His remarks come amid continued Israeli strikes in Lebanon, where more than 200 people were reported killed, even as ceasefire talks between Iran and the US move forward.
Vance said Israel had “offered … to check themselves a little bit in Lebanon because they want to make sure that our negotiation is successful”.
He warned that if Iran allows the situation in Lebanon to affect the negotiations, it could derail the talks.
“If Iran wants to let this negotiation fall apart in a conflict where they were getting hammered over Lebanon, which has nothing to do with them and which the United States never once said was part of the ceasefire, that’s ultimately their choice,” he said.
