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Air passenger traffic across India soars by 6.6% in opening months of fiscal 2025-26

Air passenger traffic across India soars by 6.6% in opening months of fiscal 2025-26

NEW DELHI: The total passenger traffic across airports in India has grown by 6.6% in the first two months of this financial year, compared to the corresponding period last year, reveals the Airports Authority of India (AAI). Srinagar and Amritsar airports, which were closed for some weeks due to the India-Pakistan conflict following the Pahalgam terror attack on April 22 this year, have reported a steep decline on the patronage front.
AAI data reveals that 71.14 million passengers travelled during April-May of 2025 as compared to 66.73 million in the period in 2024. International traffic soared by 8.8% in the period compared with 13.4 million travellers compared to 12.31 million earlier. Domestic traffic has recorded a 6.1% growth with 57.74 million against the previous 66.73 million.
A total of 5.54 crore Air Traffic Movement Movements (Arrivals and Departures) have been recorded in April-May 2025, up by 6.5% over the same period last year, the data shows.
The freight traffic too has boomed with an 8.1% increase in April and May of 2025 over the previous year by transporting 643.47 metric tonnes.
Airports which have been severely impacted due to Indo-Pak tensions were on expected lines - Srinagar and Amritsar. Passenger traffic in Srinagar dipped by a whopping 67.1% in the two months. Srinagar International Airport had a patronage of just 1,61,214 flyers as compared to 4,89,561 earlier. The Sri Guru Ramdas Ji airport in Amritsar too followed suit with 1,56,288 passengers in the first two months of this fiscal as compared to 2,75,837 last year.
The top three airports in passenger traffic in the country continue to be Delhi (93,89,191 flyers), Mumbai (65,68,271) and Bengaluru (64,43,050). The KIA airport in Bengaluru continues its non-stop growth trajectory by recording a 6.7% growth over its performance in April-May 2024. However, Delhi has dipped by 1.2% and Mumbai by 0.5% during the compared period.
Airports which have done significantly well over their past performance in the two-month period compared in succeeding years are Bhubaneshwar (25.5% over previous period), Tirupati (49.2%), Varanasi (25.8%) Kannur (33.2%), Patna (32.1%), Agra (77.8) and Agati (42.5%), Durgapur (37%), Bhuj (48.6), Cudappah (58.8%), Dharbanga (52.2%), Dehradun (29.1%), Cooch Behar (38.4%), Dimapur (27.4%), Gorakhpur (995) and Hubballi (37.1%), Jabalpur (92.2%), Jaisalmer (86.4%), Kanpur (57%) and Kishangarh (38.9%), Rajahmundry (46.3%) Nanded (28.3%) Kurnool (34.3%) and Shivamogga (85.5%)
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