EgyptAir eyes Kol, woos Tolly with discounts, offers
Times of India | 21 November 2025
Kolkata: Egypt's national carrier, EgyptAir, is wooing Tollywood with discounted fares and promises to facilitate permission to shoot at scenic and historic locations. EgyptAir country manager Amr Aly and sales manager Rajat Chadha are also promoting the Grand Museum at Giza, on the outskirts of Cairo, along with beach resorts Hurghada and Sharm El Sheikh, renowned for diving and snorkelling opportunities.
Speaking to TOI, Chadha said while Bollywood movies and Hindi film songs have been shot in Egypt for over half a century, including the Ashok Kumar starrer ‘Naaz', the Amitabh Bachchan-Zeenat Aman 1979 movie ‘The Great Gambler', the Aishwarya Rai movie ‘Jeans', and songs from ‘Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham' and ‘Singh is Kinng', it was time to get Tollywood to also experience the charm of Egypt. Only one Bengali movie — ‘Mishawr Rawhoshyo' — had been shot in 2013.
"EgyptAir, along with travel agency Karnak, will do everything possible to make it feasible for directors from Tollywood to consider Cairo, Luxor, Aswan, Alexandria, Hurghada, and Sharm El Sheikh as shoot locations," said Aly. The duo is also meeting travel trade bodies, like Travel Agents Federation of India (TAFI), Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI), and Skal International, to promote Egypt and the museum.
While EgyptAir has code-share agreements with Air India to operate flights between various cities in India and Egypt, sources said the airline is also in talks with IndiGo for an interline agreement to ferry passengers to Delhi and Mumbai from Kolkata and other cities so that they can then fly to Egypt.
The airline operates four flights a week from Delhi and five from Mumbai. It will add a flight from Delhi in winter and strive to make flights from Delhi and Mumbai daily operations. "We hope the bilateral rights allowing operation of 14 flights between the countries are increased and the airline looks at Kolkata," said Anil Punjabi of TAFI.