Airlines in the country have been facing decline in demand for a long time. In view of the festive season, Tata Group's Air India Express and online travel platform have introduced a special offer. One reason for this is to increase the demand during the festive season, so that the sale of tickets is better. Its benefit is being availed by those people who are looking for cheap tickets to go home on Diwali and Chhath Puja.
Generally, on the occasion of Diwali and Chhath, the demand for airline tickets increases significantly in the country, due to which the air fare increases manifold. But this time, contrary to expectations, airlines are finding the sale of air tickets in the country to be slow.
This time in the festive season, the sale of tickets on Tata Group's Air India Express is going on till 27th October. In this, for the journey from 1st November to 10th December, tickets are available at a fare as low as Rs 1606. Rajneesh Kumar, CEO of online travel platform ixigo, says that this time there is a reduction of 25 to 30 percent in airfares.
According to an ET report, airlines officials say that this time the airfares are likely to remain normal during the festive season also. Even airfares on some domestic routes have come down.
Airlines believe that there has been no surge in demand yet and there may be an increase in ticket sales by the coming wedding season. Airlines companies are also pushing offers from now, so that by then the demand reaches last year's level.
Last year, the Cricket World Cup took place during Diwali and after that the wedding season started. Therefore even then the sales of air tickets had increased after the festive season.
According to government data, generally more than 90 percent passenger seats are booked during the peak time of the country's festive season. But currently less than 85 percent occupancy is being seen. Perhaps this is one of those few years when airlines have offered offers during the festive season.
