High air fares and capacity constraint decelerated India’s domestic air passenger traffic growth in March, official data showed on Monday.
As per data of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation(DGCA), the air passenger traffic growth rate in March rose to a mere 0.14 percent to 115.96 lakh from 115.80 lakh reported for the corresponding month ofthe previous fiscal.
In February, the number of passengers flown by domesticairlines grew at 5.62 per cent to 1.13 crore on a year-on-year basis.
“The passenger load factor in the month of March 2019has shown decreasing trend compared to previous month due to end of vacationperiod of various sectors,” the DGCA said in its monthly traffic dataanalysis.
According to the data, January-March passenger traffic grew4.96 per cent to 354.53 lakh from 337.90 lakh ferried during the correspondingperiod of the previous year.
“Passengers carried by domestic airlines during January-March 2019 were 354.53 lakh as against 337.90 lakh during the corresponding period of previous year, thereby registering a growth of 4.92 per cent,” the data analysis said.