Amritsar int’l airport tops in domestic passenger growth

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, February 7

Sri Guru Ram Das Jee (SGRDJ) International Airport has beaten the other international airports in the country in December 2017 with highest domestic passenger growth of 83.5 per cent and aircraft movement increase of 103.5 per cent in comparison with the same month in 2016.

The footfall of domestic passengers in December 2017 reached 1,62,932 in comparison with 88,790 during the corresponding month in 2016.

Sameep Singh Gumtala, aviation analyst and overseas secretary, Amritsar Vikas Manch (NGO), stated that the analysis of the recently released data by the Airport Authority of India (AAI) for all the airports in India also revealed that the total monthly footfall of passengers (domestic and international) at the airport reached an all-time high of 2,19,216, surpassing November’s 2,13,615 passengers.

The international passengers’ footfall also increased by 8.4 per cent to 56,284 in December 2017 that 51,945 in December 2016.

In another landmark, the annual footfall of international passengers crossed 20.6 lakh in 2017, witnessing an increase of 37.4% over previous year when 15 lakh passengers landed and boarded from the city airport. The traffic between the Amritsar-Delhi sector was the highest with 11 lakh passengers followed by Amritsar-Mumbai with 2.81 lakh passengers.

Even with the addition of no international flights in 2017, total international traffic in 2017 increased by 17 per cent to 5.91 lakh passengers compared to 5.1 lakh in 2016. The Amritsar-Dubai route continued to be the highest with 2.3 lakh, followed by 1.1 lakh passengers on the Amritsar-Doha route operated by Qatar Airways.

Gumtala said, “The credit goes to domestic flights launched in 2017 to Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Srinagar, Jammu and Nanded which brought the Amritsar airport once again in the limelight.”

Amritsar continued to outpace domestic national average growth each month and also 2017 total domestic average increase of 17 per cent. Installation of CAT-3B at the airport resulted in less cancellation of flights in December compared to the previous years.

Manmohan Singh, patron of Amritsar Vikas Manch (AVM), who is also a member of the airport advisory committee, said Indian carriers did not start any international flight from Amritsar and continue to connect passengers to international destinations via Delhi. However, this is going to change with the launch of twice-weekly Amritsar-Birmingham flight on February 20, he added.