Air India says April-Nov numbers show turnaround plan’s working

A day ahead of a comprehensive review of its financial status by civil aviation minister Praful Patel, Air India said on Sunday that its turnaround plan, initiated during 2010-11, had begun to yield desired results.

The airline’s assertion comes when it has already petitioned the government for Rs1,200 crore equity infusion and is looking to further enhance this demand for financial assistance in the coming months.

In a statement, the carrier said network revenue for the April-November period increased 22.6% year on year to Rs7,250 crore after it managed to carry 13.3% more passengers at 9.05 million.

During these eight months, yield per revenue passenger kilometer (yield/RPK) on the Air-India network was up 12.2%. Of the total network revenue, Rs4,401 crore (Rs 3,801 crore) was from international flights, while domestic revenue jumped 35% to Rs2,849 crore (Rs2,110 crore).

Chairman and managing director Arvind Jadhav said in the statement: “The results are very encouraging and reflect the commitment of our employees. We have just begun the turnaround journey and we have a long way to go.”

On its international network, passenger traffic improved to 3.74 million passengers compared with 3.61 million passengers in the year-ago period, an increase of 3.5%. On its domestic network, passenger traffic was up at 5.32 million passengers from 4.38 million in the year-ago period, an increase of 21.4%.

This increase in passenger traffic compares favourably with network capacity addition by Air India of only 4% during the period —- 2% on the international network and 11.4% on the domestic network.

The airline registered an overall passenger load factor of 66.3% during April-November 2010, up from 63.1% the previous year. On its international network, the passenger load factor increased to 65% from 62.2%, while on its domestic network, the passenger load factor increased to 70.4% from 66.2% during this period.