Despite rapid growth, India still has fewer planes in air than Southwest Airlines: Akasa

The demography of aviation customers is changing as one-third of the air traffic comes from tier 2 and 3 cities, said Aditya Ghosh, Co-founder of Akasa Air. Ghosh compared the aviation industry to 2012 when 90 percent of the air traffic in India ran between Delhi and Mumbai. “The heartland from where the consumer is coming is changing,” Ghosh said in his presentation at Motilal Oswal’s 19th Annual Global Investor Conference.

Ghosh told Moneycontrol on the sidelines of the event that demand in tier 2 and 3 cities is secular throughout the country. “It’s not like there is one particular state that is doing better than the others. We see demand throughout the country. What is also happening is that the state governments themselves are very active in attracting tourism and air travel. So 15-20 years ago there would be one city that would see air travel in any particular state; now there are states that have multiple airports, which are doing well and seeing traffic,” Ghosh remarked.

Ghosh added that India is still an under-penetrated aircraft market. “ I used to say in 2006 that the entire Indian aviation industry has less number of aeroplanes than Southwest Airlines. I’m saying this in 2023, the entire Indian aviation industry put together still does not have the same number of airplanes as Southwest Airlines. One airline in the US, which is not even the largest airline in the US, has more narrow-body jets than the entire Indian aviation industry put together” said Ghosh.