Domestic air passenger traffic down 66% YoY in Sept: DGCA

India's domestic air passenger traffic declined 66 per cent year-on-year in September, the data released by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said on Wednesday. Over 39,43,000 passengers travelled in September compared to 1.1 crore in September 2019.

The total number of passengers carried by domestic airlines during Jan-Sept stood at 4.4 crore against 10.58 crore during the corresponding period of the previous year, thereby registering annual degrowth of 58.39 per cent, the aviation regulator added.

IndiGo, which is India's largest airline in terms of market share, reported a drop in its market share at 57.5 per cent against 59.4 per cent during the same period last year.

SpiceJet's market share increased to 13.4 per cent vs 13.8 per cent during a year-ago period. State-owned Air India saw its market share decline 9.4 per cent compared to 9.8 per cent during the same period in FY20.

During September 2020, a total of 450 passenger related complaints had been received by the scheduled domestic airlines. The number of complaints per 10,000 passengers carried for the month stood at around 1.14.

Recovery in domestic air passenger traffic continued in September with a sequential growth about 37-39 per cent in passenger volume in the previous month over August, ratings agency Icra had said in a release in October 5. The passenger volumes, however, plunged around 60 per cent in September over the same month year-ago, it said in a release.

The Civil Aviation Ministry in June had permitted increasing the capacity to 45 per cent with effect from June 27 from a maximum of one-third at the time of resumption of domestic flights from May 25, which was further scaled up to 60 per cent from September 2.

This apart, the ministry in late August announced other relaxations also such as allowing airlines to provide meals onboard, serve pre-packed snacks/meals/ pre-packaged beverages, and allowing in-flight entertainment, however with certain riders.

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