o there's not enough O&D for a MAN-DEL route. What little there is would be very low yield VFR and that travels with EK. There was never a question of a MAN-DEL route. A business/commercial MAN-BOM route might just possibly be a different matter, but don't hold your breath.
Frank, just to back up Ringwayman's point, at a presentation I attended about 2 years ago, Mumbai and Delhi were 6th and 7th in a list of underserved or unserved long haul destinations from MAN. In fact, they were a few positions above Jeddah which now has a 4 x weekly service. I'd be surprised if that situation has changed dramatically since then.
Again, to support Ringwayman's point that new services stimulate demand, Saudia have averaged 230 pax per flight over the last 3 months. CX has already clocked up over 101,000 pax in the 9 and a half months since the 4 x weekly flights commenced during December last year with some very impressive LFs.
New York was top of the list as an underserved long haul route and the new services provided by Delta and TCX plus extra capacity from AA this summer has produced 76,000 pax to JFK & EWR in the last 2 months.
So yes, I'm disappointed if it turns out that AI has cancelled plans for MAN because it has got slots at LHR for a third daily flight.