Super Sunday: Domestic flyers cross five-lakh mark for the first time

NEW DELHI: Nov 17 turned out to be a Super Sunday for Indian aviation with the number of domestic flyers in a day crossing the five-lakh mark for the first time ever. Like last year, domestic air travel this time started picking up soon after Diwali (Oct 31) with the wedding season that started just before Nov 10. Since then about 4.9 lakh people were flying within the country and the five-lakh mark was finally breached on Nov 17.

Sanjay Kumar, a veteran of Indian aviation, said with airlines adding capacity and airfares being not very high the numbers will rise even further this winter.

“The peak is yet to come and mid-Jan could be the peak of peaks for this year. The next two months will see an increase in travel with the marriage season; diaspora coming home to visit friends and relatives; students studying abroad coming back for Christmas holiday and foreign & domestic tourists. I am very bullish on Indian aviation,” Kumar said.

Sunday’s 3,173 domestic flights carried over 5 lakh passengers. Airlines’ went pretty full with IndiGo, Air India, SpiceJet and Akasa seeing over 90 per cent occupancies.

While IndiGo and Tata’s Air India group are adding planes very aggressively, the return of SpiceJet from the brink with recent funding and the end of the strike at Boeing that raises hopes of the troubled US aerospace major steadying deliveries of B737s to Akasa and AI Express shows capacity will only increase. New airline Fly91 is adding planes along with other big regional players.

Star Air, IndiGo, Air India and Akasa currently have about 1,700 aircraft on order from Airbus and Boeing.

Also, airports at Greater Noida and Navi Mumbai will open next summer apart from several others across India. India is spending over Rs 92,000 crore for the construction of new airports and expansion of existing ones. According to aviation minister Ram Mohan Naidu, India will have 200 airports in 2025 and 200 more will be developed in the next 20-25 years.

The increased number of planes and airports will provide a further fillip to aviation.

Indian carriers have increased their capacity by almost 9 per cent this year, with 24 crore seats across both the domestic and international markets. “This is just the tip of the iceberg, with over 1.4 billion people, a vast geographical expanse and growing economic corridors, India’s air traffic is geared up for a huge exponential growth in the coming future,” Naidu had recently said.