As the aviation sector recovers from pandemic-induced turbulence, crowded airports even leading to congestion have become common sights. This is the scenario even as passenger traffic in FY23 was 4 per cent below pre-pandemic levels, and the sector is expected to grow by 20 per cent in the year to come.
Even before the financial year started, domestic air traffic went up by 21.4 per cent in March 2023, compared to the same period last year.
Indigo continues to lead the fleet
Almost 1.3 crore people took domestic flights during the month as compared to one crore people in March 2022.
For the entire January to Mach quarter, airlines clocked a 51 per cent rise in domestic passenger traffic.
Despite the rise of Tata's Air India and Vistara's upcoming merger into it, sectoral leader Indigo continued to grow and increased its market share to 56.8 per cent.
Others lagging behind ahead of expansion
Air India remained in second place despite a drop in market share to 8.8 per cent, followed by Vistara which bagged 8.7 per cent and Go First at 6.9 per cent.
The results come at the end of a year when airlines added more than 130 aircraft, and are signing deals for more than 1,500 carriers.
As airlines expand, the overall cancellation rate for the sector settled down at 0.28 per cent, with regional airline Flybig scrapping the highest number of flights.
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