India's domestic air traffic grows by 4 per cent

Domestic air traffic in India grew by over 4 per cent in the lean month of September, with Air India gaining strength in its market share and load factor than before.

All six Indian carriers together carried almost 457 lakh passengers between January and September as against 438 lakh during the same period in 2012, thereby registering a growth of 4.23 per cent, according to air traffic data released by DGCA on Sunday.

The six domestic airlines reported an over 13 per cent increase in the number of passengers flown in September this year at 45.55 lakh, compared to 40.18 lakh passengers flown during the same period the previous year.

While IndiGo continued to lead in the market share with 30.3 per cent, Jet Airways and its subsidiary JetLite together had a share of 24.6 per cent, with Jet alone accounting for 19.1 per cent.

Air India’s market share in its domestic operations improved to 20.3 per cent from being at the level of 17-19 per cent during the past several months, while its passenger load factor was the highest at 73.2 per cent in September compared with IndiGo in the second possition with 70.3 per cent. AI flew 9.26 lakh passengers last month followed by Jet Airways which carried 8.70 lakh passengers and JetLite 2.52 lakh.

SpiceJet which carried 7.86 lakh passengers in September 2013 had a market share of 17.3 per cent.