Air traffic has picked up in recent months after the airline industry was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia pegged the monthly domestic air passenger traffic to touch 1.29 crore in December 2022 to cross the pre-COVID level, terming it a healthy trend and a good sign for the industry. The number of domestic air passengers in December 2019 was 1.26 crore.
According to a graphic shared by the minister on his Twitter handle on Tuesday, “2022 has set a new record in air passenger movement.” The traffic had reached 1.29 crore in December last year.
There is a healthy trend of late in domestic passenger movement – a good sign for the aviation sector, the minister said in a tweet. “Monthly Domestic Passengers Crossed Pre-Covid-29 High in December 2022!” Scindia said.
Recently, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) revealed that air traffic increased by nearly 27 per cent to 114.07 lakh in October, as against 89.85 lakh a year ago.
Indian airlines carried 11.4 million passengers in October, which is 10 percent more than the number of people who flew in September. The air traffic count in September stood at 103.55 lakh. The market share of the country’s largest airline IndiGo declined to 56.7 per cent in October from 58 per cent in the previous month.