Ahead of the long Diwali weekend, airfares across destinations have gone through the roof, with the Mumbai-Delhi route — the busiest in India — even reporting a total sellout of non-stop flights.
Fares have jumped two to three times the normal level on non-leisure destinations and up to four to five times on holiday destinations, according to data from travel companies for the weekend.
While Diwali traditionally sees high consumer air traffic, travel companies acknowledge that the fare increase seen this year is unprecedented. Compared with last year’s Diwali, this year’s fares are a minimum two times higher.
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“The long Diwali weekend is the most appealing time to travel. Back-to-back lockdowns in earlier years have increased the urge to travel this year, reflected in the booking rate which is up by 60-70% over last year,” Nishant Pitti, CEO and co-founder, EaseMyTrip, said.
October 20 has emerged as the most popular travel date to Delhi from Mumbai as IndiGo, India’s largest airline, has reported a total sellout for the date.
All direct flights of Vistara, the country’s second-biggest airline by market share, are sold out for the same date, while fares for other flights with one stoppage range around `20,000 to `50,000. All non-stop flights from Mumbai to Delhi of Tata Group-owned Air India are sold out for October 20.
Indiver Rastogi, president & group head, global business travel, Thomas Cook (India) and SOTC Travel, said: “There is a surge in positive consumer sentiment and this is driving our demand for the upcoming Diwali period by 50-60% against last year. There is a considerable surge in airfares to high-load domestic destinations compared to pre-cap removal.”
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Leisure destinations are enjoying an even better demand. According to Thomas Cook, a flight to Andaman from Mumbai is priced at `51,000 during the Diwali weekend this year against `19,000 last year. Airfares to Kerala from Mumbai are priced at `30,000 against `12,000 last year.
“As far as airfares are concerned, there are multiple factors that come into play such as the function of demand and supply, operational environment, seasonality, cost, competition, market sentiment, etc. Therefore, it is difficult to make any specific predictions, given the dynamic nature of the business,” a Vistara spokesperson said.
The level of passenger load per flight has improved substantially and was an average of 82% for India’s top three airlines — IndiGo, Vistara and Air India — by the end of September compared with 63% in January for the same three airlines, who control three-fourths of the domestic market. “There is a steep spike of 40% when compared to last year’s Diwali period prices. Overall, the segment size has gone up by 5% on an average this year,” a spokesperson from Cleartrip said.