Indian aviation registers record 128.93 lakh domestic fliers in Jan-March quarter

Indian aviation has registered 128.93 lakh fliers in the first quarter of 2023. As per DGCA's record, about 375.04 lakh people took domestic flights during Jan-March 2023. This is just short of the best ever quarter, that is Q4CY19 that recorded 381 lakh passengers who caught domestic flights.

This record high is reported at a time when airlines faced challenges like shortage of planes due to grounding. This affected Indigo and GoFirst.

However, Indigo had managed to capture over half the market in the month of March, while the rest of the airlines struggled to manage even 10%. Indigo carried 73.17 lakh passengers in the month of March alone. This was the first time Indigo had crossed the 70 lakh passenger mark in a month.

As per MoneyControl, after a few months in the number two position, Air India was pushed to number three in March by Vistara. However, Air India closed the quarter as the second-largest player in the country. Across the three Tata carriers, the collective market share now stands at 25.1 percent, about five percent lower than their target of 30 percent under the Vihaan.AI transformation plan. While Air India has more capacity in the market, Vistara has been able to push Air India out with higher load factors.

Meanwhile airlines Spicejet and GoFirst are shrinking fast at the market share. SpiceJet hasn't added any new aircraft since the last quarter of FY22. Problems hover over GoFirst due to the Grounding issues as it is unable to acquire replacement engines. However, both the airlines had high load factors in March.