Over 66% Indians planning vacation this festive season: Survey

Over 66 percent of respondents are planning to travel during the festival season mainly encouraged by long weekends, cheaper flight tickets and a burst of budget hotel deals, according to a survey.

An overwhelming 66 percent of respondents are planning to travel during the festival season, leveraging the long weekends over Diwali and Dussehra, a Yatra.com survey has revealed.

Online travel portal Yatra.com conducted the survey among 5,098 respondents.

While the hill stations and Goa have been highlighted as top choices amongst domestic destinations, Europe and Thailand top the list of most favoured international destinations, it said.

One of the key findings of the survey is an emerging trend of luxury travel.

"The rupee stability has allowed a 22.6 percent of the respondents to increase their spending capacity to spend above Rs 50,000 per person on travel. Though most of the travellers are spending time and money planning an international vacation, travellers are also embarking on domestic travel for shorter trips, which are considerably more affordable," it added.

About 47.8 percent made a choice for budget hotels, while 32 percent of respondents chose 4-5 star luxury properties, it said.

"Vacationing in the festive months seems to have become the norm amongst Indian travellers. With Durga Puja, Navratri, Dussehra and Diwali on the horizon, we have observed an increase in leisure travel, reflected by improvement in passenger loads on flights to beach and hill destinations," Yatra.com President Sharat Dhall said.

"With respect to international travel, the stability of the rupee has provided an impetus for travellers to plan trips abroad," Dhall added.

The survey also revealed that desktops and mobile are the preferred medium of booking and showing that there is a steep decline in demand for travel agents with the number being a mere 10.6 percent.