Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju tweeted, "Indian aviation continues to soar. July passenger growth reaches a record breaking 25%"
Domestic air passenger traffic jumped by nearly 26% in July, registering double-digit growth for the 24th consecutive month with lower fares attracting more fliers. No-frills carrier IndiGo saw its market share climb to 39.8% -- the highest for any local airline -- last month. It had a market share of 37.9% in June. Latest data from aviation regulator DGCA showed that local airlines flew 85.08 lakh passengers in July compared to 67.62 lakh fliers recorded in the year-ago period.
This is the 24th straight month that domestic air traffic has registered high double-digit growth, which also comes against the backdrop of many airlines offering lower fares as they compete to attract more passengers. "Indian aviation continues to soar. July passenger growth reaches a record breaking 25%," Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju said in a tweet.
In terms of market share in July, IndiGo is followed by Jet Airways (16.3%), Air India (14.8%), SpiceJet (11.7%), GoAir (8.4%), Vistara (2.6%) and AirAsia (2.2%). When it comes to load factor -- a measure of seat occupancy in flights -- low-cost carrier SpiceJet emerged on top with 92% in July. The same stood at 93% in June. During July, IndiGo's load factor stood at 83.6%, higher than 77.9% seen in the previous month.
Among other airlines, GoAir registered a load factor of 90.3%, followed by Air Asia with 85.7% while that of Jet Airways and Vistara were 83.8% and 75.2%, respectively. National carrier Air India registered a lower load factor of 80.3% in July compared to 82% in June. Scheduled domestic airlines shelled out compensation to the tune of Rs 35.56 lakh for denied boarding to passengers last month.
For cancellations, the carriers gave a total compensation of Rs 23.22 lakh while the overall amount for flight delays, a total amount of Rs 61.33 lakh was given "towards compensation and facilities". According to DGCA, 1,111 passengers were affected by denied boarding, 4,796 people by cancellations and delays impacted 65,953 passengers. Last month, as many as 948 passenger-related complaints were received by the scheduled domestic airlines with maximum number coming against Air Pegasus -- which saw disruptions in its operations amid financial woes.
As much as 34.2% complaints were related to flight problems, followed by customer service (27.4%) and baggage (17.5%). "Passengers carried by domestic airlines during Jan-Jul 2016 were 560.87 lakh as against 455.95 lakh during the corresponding period of previous year, thereby registering a growth of 23.01%," DGCA said. SpiceJet said that in July it registered best On-Time Performance (OTP) and highest Passenger Load Factor (PLF) among major carriers having sizeable operations in the four metros of Bengaluru, Delhi, Hyderabad and Mumbai.
"OTP for the month of July 2016 stood at 79.2%; while the airline again topped the PLF chart registering 92% for the same period," it said in a release. Further, the airline said diligent planning and efficient utilisation of the resources, among other factors, helped it improve performance in July.
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