Revival of air traffic from Tirupati raises hopes on new services

Tirupati: The subsided Covid-19 impact and the resumption of all activities helped in an upward swing of air traffic from the pilgrim city. After experiencing a huge drop in passenger volume and aircraft movement during 2020-21, now the airport has become one of the busiest airports in the State wooing the airline operators to schedule new services to various destinations in the coming days.

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) data clearly indicates an increase of 89.8 per cent in passenger volume during 2021-22 (till February) whereas the aircraft movements have gone up steeply upwards by 94.3 per cent. This growth rate has to be seen in comparison with the previous fiscal year's figures which was the worst-hit due to the pandemic.

In the 2020-21 fiscal, the passenger footfall was only 3,53,375 and the aircraft movements were limited to 4,612 after experiencing a huge fall of 57.8 per cent and 52.4 per cent respectively compared to 2019-20. Needless to say that in 2019-20 the airport's passenger volume was 8,34,961 and 9,698 aircraft operations were held from Tirupati.

The global pandemic that led to a substantial drop in passenger demand in 2020-21 has clearly witnessed a rebound by the next year itself as the passenger footfall shot up to 5,45,251 in 11 months since April 2021. During the same period, 7,298 flights were operated through Tirupati airport. Still it has to go a long way to touch the pre-Covid figures in 2019-20.

As there has been a significant rise in demand for flights to Tirupati, even travel agencies were of the view that the passenger footfall may reach the pre-Covid stage in the coming fiscal. The lifting of restrictions on international travel from March 27, after almost a gap of two years, may help boost passenger volume through this airport as many passengers from the region will travel from Tirupati to other cities to catch international flights.

Tirupati MP Dr M Gurumoorthy was also making efforts to connect the city with several other destinations in the country under UDAN scheme. If demand continues to increase as per the projections, the existing airlines – Indigo, SpiceJet and Air India that are operating from Tirupati may be forced to fly additional routes which will entice other airlines also to enter the city with their operations.