Domestic aviation market continues on growth trajectory in the new year with the air passenger traffic up by over 22 per cent in January even as the seat factor declined marginally during the period due to the end of tourist season.
Indian carriers together flew 76.55 lakh passengers in January 2016 as compared to 62.45 lakh fliers ferried by them during the same period in the previous year, logging 22.58 per cent growth, according to the DGCA data released today.
Budget carrier IndiGo maintained its leadership position carrying 27.26 lakh passengers, more than one-thirds of the total traffic pie, while another budget carrier SpiceJet continued seeing highest seat occupancy in its aircraft at 92.1 per cent during the month.
While, Jet Airways and JetLite combined flew flew 21.4 lakh passengers with a market share of 21.4 per cent, national carrier Air India transported 12.23 lakh passengers, cornering 16 per cent of the total air passenger traffic in January 2016.
SpiceJet and GoAir also carried 10.11 lakh and 6.20 lakh passengers respectively during this period, according to the DGCA data.
On the other side, the number of passengers flown by the two startup carriers Vistar and AirAsia during January stood at 1.50 lakh and 1.75 lakh respectively, cornering 2 per cent and 2.3 per cent market share respectively.
The passenger load factor in the month of January 2016 has slightly decreased compared to previous month primarily due to the end of tourist season, the DGCA said.
"For the ninth consecutive month in a row, SpiceJet has once again recorded the highest passenger load factor of all airlines in India.
"In addition, the cancellation rate for the airline at 0.5 per cent was the lowest of all pan-India operators and the On-Time Performance (about 75 per cent) was amongst the best," SpiceJet said in a statement.
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