From Amritsar in the north to Thiruvananthapuram in the south, travellers from India’s smaller airports are increasingly flying out to cities such as Singapore, Dubai and Bangkok, in a sign of rising prosperity in smaller towns and growing overseas connectivity.
International air traffic at all Indian airports combined rose 13% on year to 24.8 million in April-July, surpassing 22.6 million in the same period before the pandemic, shows the latest data from the Airports Authority of India (AAI). However, these numbers hide the roaring growth in cities including Amritsar, Bhubaneswar, Lucknow, Kozhikode, Kannur and Thiruvananthapuram.
Some of the non-metro airports have seen overseas passenger traffic jump over 20%, according to Vinay Kumar G, vice president & sector head – corporate ratings at Icra Ltd. This, he said, was largely attributable to rising demand for international travel for leisure, jobs—primarily in the Middle East—and studies.
India’s aviation market—the world’s third largest and also the fastest growing—is on the cusp of a boom as the economy expands and incomes rise, prompting airlines to add capacity. Much of the demand is expected to be generated from outside Metro airports, some of which are already grappling with capacity constraints.
Doubling traffic
Take Bhubaneswar for example. Accorded the international status in 2013, overseas traffic at the airport more than doubled from a year earlier to 41,510 passengers in April-July, and it was 48% higher than the pre-covid levels. The airport was connected to Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok in 2019, and now offers flights to Singapore, Dubai, and Bangkok as well.
Amritsar reported a 29% year-on-year growth in April-July to 344,541 overseas flyers—a 32% jump from prior to covid.
Passengers flying abroad from Kozhikode rose 15% on year and more than 3% over the pre-covid level to over 1 million passengers in April-July. The jump at Lucknow was 33% year-on-year and 40% over same period in 2019 to nearly 370,000 passengers.
To be sure, Delhi, India’s largest airport by traffic, handled 6.8 million overseas passengers in April-July, 15% higher on year and over 18% more than the pre-pandemic levels. Second-ranked Mumbai reported a 12% increase to around 5 million international travellers, while state-run Chennai airport reported a 3% increase over a year earlier to 2 million international passengers, nearly the same as the pre-covid period.
Confined to medium-haul
Air travel outside India from tier 2 locations has been confined to medium-haul flights and is focused on the Middle East and Southeast Asian countries, said Jagannarayan Padmanabhan, senior director & global head, transport, mobility and logistics, consulting, Crisil Market Intelligence and Analytics.
The growth has come predominantly due to increase in flights and announcement of new routes from these locations, primarily by IndiGo, he said. “We expect this trend to continue with other tier-2 location airports. The long-haul routes will continue to be serviced or connected from airports in Metro locations.”
That reflects in the kind of planes Indian carriers are buying. Of more than 1,600 aircraft ordered, more than 1,500 are narrow-body planes which can cover up to nearly eight hours of flying time, according to industry executives.
“Airlines are increasingly looking to experiment with nearby foreign destinations from tier-2 cities where travellers are increasingly more inclined towards taking international trips on the back of rise in income levels and increase in spending power on leisure travel,” an airline executive said.
The Tata Group-backed Air India Express is working on doubling its share of short-haul overseas market over a period of five years and wants to be the carrier of choice in a network of tier II and III destinations. The nation’s largest carrier IndiGo has reiterated that the Indian market is still largely underpenetrated for international air travel. Over the last one year, IndiGo added a total of 17 new destinations—10 domestic and 7 international.
Anticipating demand growth
Foreign airlines also anticipate growth demand from smaller cities. In June, Etihad launched four weekly flights from Jaipur. Thai Airways told Mint recently that it plans to connect to secondary cities of India under its next phase of expansion here.
Indian carriers alone flew 8 million international passengers in April-June, an increase of 16.7% on year, according to Suprio Banerjee, vice president & sector head – corporate ratings at Icra. The rating and research firm estimates India’s international passenger traffic to grow 13-15% to 77-80 million in FY25 and in double digits in FY26.
Indian carriers would be looking at adding new routes to smaller cities or serving the existing ones as penetration of non-metro airports and passenger traffic grows over time, Banerjee said.