Hub-and-spoke networks and through check-in

In a hub-and-spoke network, an airline routes traffic from many smaller cities — the spokes — through one large airport, the hub, from which the long-haul international flights depart. The commercial logic is that a route between two small cities may not fill an aircraft, but the same passengers pooled at a hub will fill a wide-body to Europe or North America. What the government's framework adds is procedural rather than commercial. Under the Ahmedabad arrangement, an international passenger completes check-in to the final destination and clears immigration at Ahmedabad; on arrival at Delhi they transfer to the international flight without reclaiming and re-checking baggage and without changing terminals. That removes the specific friction that made a domestic-then-international connection at an Indian airport slower than flying out through a Gulf hub — which is what the strategy is competing against. Air India operationalised this at Ahmedabad through its 'Easy Connect' branding, designating two daily Ahmedabad-Delhi services for the purpose: AI1121 from 1 September 2026 and AI1117 from 2 September 2026.