Civil aviation industry posts 19% growth in domestic passenger traffic -Governance Now

Civil aviation industry posts 19% growth in domestic passenger traffic

Jayant Sinha, minister of state for civil aviation, says that Air India has performed extremely well during the last three years

GN Bureau | May 31, 2017

#civil aviation #domestic air travel #Jayant Sinha

The civil aviation industry has registered a growth of 19 percent in domestic passenger traffic from about 6.1 crore in 2014 to 10 crore in 2016-17, making India the third largest aviation market globally.

Jayant Sinha, minister of state for civil aviation, said that the national carrier Air India has also performed extremely well during the last three years.

Ministry officials attributed regional connectivity scheme –UDAN, as a reason behind surge in the number of passengers and said the scheme has made air travel possible for even the common man in remote areas.

According to P Ashok Gajapathy Raju, union minister for civil aviation, the average airfares plummeted by 18 percent during the last fiscal. “Scheduled domestic flight movements have risen from 7 lakh in 2014 to 8.2 lakh in 2016, an 8.2 percent growth. As against 395 aircraft in the fleet of Indian carriers, there are 496 aircrafts in operation today, and another 654 are under purchase,” the minister said.

Raju highlighted other achievements of the ministry like promoting ease of doing business by allowing 100 percent FDI in domestic scheduled air transport, open skies service agreements offers to 49 countries and five SAARC nations etc., developing robust security architecture by complying with ICAO requirements and Anti Hijacking Act.

Jayant Sinha said as against 70-75 airports in the country in all these years, the ministry has now over 100 airports with the implementation of UDAN. “We hope to have 200 plus airports in the next 10-15 years. Capacity of existing major airports is also being increased rapidly, while Greenfield airports are coming up at Goa, Navi Mumbai and other places,” he said.

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