Friday the 13th brought some good news for Indian aviation. The daily departure count crossed 60 percent of pre-Covid levels for the first time. Passenger numbers, at 225,097, were the highest since May 25, when airlines were allowed to re-start operations. Subsequently, Diwali week pushed the numbers higher.
October also brought in some cheer with 31 percent growth over September. November is already looking better, thanks to the movement of people due to festivities.
While airlines have been allowed to operate 70 percent of pre-Covid flights now — a long way from 33 percent, when it began — the real questions are over where the traffic is moving and who is on those flights. An exclusive analysis shared by ICF, a global consulting and digital services company, shows that traffic has nosedived between Tier I to Tier I routes.
The two Tata airlines were at the forefront in deploying capacity, with AirAsia India deploying 63 percent of last October and Vistara deploying 58 percent. Market leader IndiGo deployed 55 percent of capacity. While the government has capped capacity at 60 percent for October, it was at pre-Covid levels and a few airlines have grown since last October, which makes their capacity look more than 60 percent compared to last October.
There were 63 new routes this October compared with the same month the previous year, with 20 of them being between Tier I and II and 25 between Tier II and Tier II, according to the analysis by ICF. Air India is the only carrier that has increased flights between Tier I to Tier I while both IndiGo and Vistara have dropped such sectors by 9 percent.
The trend is in continuation of previous months, with September seeing a drop of 63 percent over last September for flights between Tier I cities and the drop being lowest for flights between Tier I and Tier II.
24/11/20 Ameya Joshi/Moneycontrol.com
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