Bengaluru: About 30,000 passengers now fly through the Kempegowda International Airport (KIA) on average every day, in encouraging signs for the travel industry that’s recovering from the pandemic. Good connectivity to smaller destinations is driving the numbers. Last month, there were an average 270 flights to nonmetro cities daily.
According to the KIA operator, Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL), it now connects 61 destinations across the country and five new locations — Agra, Kurnool, Rajkot, Durgapur and Dibrugarh — are in the pipeline. The increased connectivity from the tech capital, it said, indicates a positive trend in air travel to non-metro cities. Before the pandemic, Bengaluru catered to 58 domestic destinations.
Improved regional connectivity has led to a threefold increase in transfer passengers. As one of the main centres in south India, Bengaluru holds a geographical advantage, providing fast and easy access to catchment areas in the south and other non-metro airports. The share of nonmetro passengers increased from 55 per cent in 2019-20 to 64 per cent in the financial year 2020-21.
The new destinations connected from Bengaluru are Jorhat, Gorakhpur and Jharsuguda. Operations started last month. Silchar, Darbhanga, Amritsar, Nashik and Jabalpur are the other new routes that were launched earlier in 2020-21. Flights to Rajkot, Durgapur and Dibrugarh are expected to start by February-end and to Agra and Kurnool by mid-March.
21/02/21 Times of India
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