Domestic air traffic grew by 25% in Jan

The airline operators in India ferried around 25 per cent more domestic flyers in January, the first month after demonetisation, in comparison to the same month of the previous year. In the report, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has also concluded that the cause of around 70 per cent flight delays were due to crew members.

"In January, the domestic airlines in the country carried 95.7 lakh air passengers which were around 76.5 lakh in January 2016. The increase for domestic passengers in January 2017 was over 25 per cent which was recorded around 22 per cent in the previous year,' said a senior officer of Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) quoting the monthly data for January.

DGCA compiles and releases data of domestic airlines on monthly basis. "Demonetisation has negligible impact on civil aviation sector in the country contrary to the fear of slowdown, we have witnessed significant growth," he added.

However, the number of passengers suffered from denied boarding, cancellations and delays were alarmingly high.

In comparison to January 2016, around 135 per cent more passengers were denied boarding this January. Similarly, 20,010 passengers suffered due to flight cancellations which were 8763 passengers more in the same month of the previous year. The number of passengers suffered due to flight delay of over two hours stood at 2.39 lakh in January which was 1.16 lakh in January 2016.

On Time Performance (OTP), the most controversial data which is used by airlines to attract customers as a certificate of 'punctuality' was highest for Spice jet.

The second most punctual airline was Indigo followed by Go Air. According to the data, the flight cancellations by domestic airlines in the country were the same but cancellation under miscellaneous category witnesses a 20.6 per cent increase.