Indian airlines Oct-Dec overseas traffic up 22% on year
NEW DELHI : Domestic carriers registered a 22% increase in international air traffic to and from India at 7.7 million passengers, as per the latest data available for the October-December period, the fruits of a likely sustained post-pandemic focus by Indian airlines to expand their international network. As per data from the regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation, Indian airlines also registered an increase in the cumulative market shareof international flights to and from India at 44.6% in the period.
Their share was 43.5% seen in the same quarter a year ago for a total of 6.3 million passengers. For the entire calendar year 2023, domestic carriers garnered a market share of 44.4% by transporting 28.4 million international passengers, a sharp increase from 38% recorded in pre-pandemic 2019 when the passenger count was around 24.2 million.
Scheduled international flight operations resumed in India in March 2022 after a two-year shutdown due to the covid pandemic. Another sign of a bounce-back is that while the total international traffic for 2023 – for both international and domestic carriers – is still 0.5% lower at 63.9 million passengers than the 2019 figure of 64.2 million, the Indian airlines have outpaced their pre-pandemic levels of international air traffic.
Domestic carriers registered a growth of 17% in the number of passengers they carried on international flights during 2023 while the total overseas traffic carried by foreign carriers is still 11% lower at 35.5 million passengers than the 2019 levels of 40 million passengers. For the Oct-Dec period, India’s largest airline IndiGo held a market share of 18.2% as compared with 15.6% a year ago.
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