A recent move on the part of Air India, aided by the Government of India, to seek permission to overfly China’s Xinjiang airspace combines a host of contemporary elements that create tension between State sovereignty and the functional imperatives of international civil aviation.

Driven by Pakistan’s denial of access to Indian civilian carriers through their airspace, which has significantly raised operational costs, lengthened travel time to Europe and North America, and made several routes economically unviable, such a request directly invokes the fundamental tenets of international air law—in large measure those contained within the Convention on International Civil Aviation (Chicago Convention, 1944)—and renders necessary an analysis of India’s legal position.