New Delhi, Oct. 23: The board of Indian Airlines today decided to lease six 70-seater jets for a five-year period and five Airbus-320s for about three years. The bill for this rental could be as much as $37 million.

The decision to lease more planes is in addition to the 43 aircraft that Indian Airlines is buying from Airbus. Top officials said the domestic airlines could be taking either Embraer or Bombardier regional jets on lease.

The single-aisle jets will go to IA’s subsidiary Alliance Air to fly on routes like Calcutta-Pune and Calcutta-Jaipur, where the demand is low but consistent and the Airbuses prove to be too costly to run.

However, airline sources also cautioned that this lease could prove tricky as Indian Airlines does not have the engineering facilities to handle Bombardier or Embraer repairs and has been specialising in servicing only Airbuses for quite a long time.

IA has identified some 16 routes where traffic is more than can be handled by the 50 seater ATRs but less than the 120-seater Airbuses.

The board of IA, at its meeting here today, gave in-principle approval to these proposals. The Requests for Proposal (RFP) documents would be issued “as soon as possible” so that these aircraft are inducted by March 2007.

The leased Airbuses are likely to act as stop-gaps till the Airbuses which are being purchased come in.

Indian Airlines plans to launch operations to new global routes like the UK (Birmingham), China, South Africa and Australia and has already tied up with a leasing firm to include two wide-bodied A-330s by early next year. The five leased A-320s would be powered by the latest CFM-2500 A1 engines, which can only be fitted in the new aircraft.

The decision to get more aircraft comes soon after a public outburst by civil aviation minister Praful Patel against the top brass of the two state-run airlines.

Both airlines, along with most airlines operating within India, have shown lower profit figures, while Air-India has also managed to earn passenger ire for frequent aircraft breakdowns.

IA officials said the mix of 50-seater ATRs, 70-seater regional jets, 122-seater A319s, 145-seater A320s and 170-seater A321 aircraft would help the airline tap all route segments.