A fishing boat returns home off Port Blair, in the Andaman Islands. (PTI)

A fifth daily flight to Port Blair will take off from the city in October.

SpiceJet, a “low-cost airline”, announced on Monday its daily operations between Calcutta and the islands, and also its decision to resume its daily direct flights to Delhi and Bangalore from Calcutta.

More are in the offing, as Kingfisher Airlines has “almost finalised” its plans to fly to Port Blair from the city from October and Jetlite, which operates a flight on the route, is likely to introduce one more.

“In all probability, we will start operations from October,” said a Kingfisher official.

SpiceJet’s decision to fly daily to the Andamans has been prompted by the “eagerness of a large number of travellers” to visit the islands and to “hive off the limited scope of travel modes on the sector”, said Samyukth Sridharan, the chief commercial officer of the airline. A one-way journey will cost Rs 5,500 (inclusive of taxes).

“Port Blair is one of the most popular domestic tourist destinations, with most flights going full every day,” said Anil Punjabi, the chairman (east) of Travel Agents Federation of India. Presently, Indian, Jet Airways, Air Deccan and Jetlite (Air Sahara) fly daily to Port Blair.

SpiceJet is also resuming direct daily flights to Bangalore and Delhi. The Delhi flight will take off on August 29, while that to Bangalore will start in October.

Airline officials said they are also exploring possibilities to fly to Southeast and South Asia. “We are conducting surveys in the Asean countries and in West Asia,” said Sridharan.