New Delhi: India is a key aviation market for the Asia Pacific region as well as the rest of the world and is expected to see robust air travel demand, global airlines' grouping IATA said on Tuesday amid the country's domestic air passenger traffic inching towards pre-COVID levels. After being significantly hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Indian aviation sector is on the recovery path and airlines are also ramping up their staff as well as expanding routes to cater to the rising travel demand.
On October 9, the daily number of domestic air passengers touched 4 lakh, nearing the pre-COVID level and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday described the trend as a "great sign". India's civil aviation sector is poised for phenomenal growth in terms of passengers, aircraft and airport. The country is projected to have 40 crore air travellers, including domestic and international, by 2027, Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said in August.
During an online briefing on Tuesday, IATA's Regional Vice President for Asia Pacific Philip Goh said the Indian market is a "very important market and is already contributing massively to some parts of the world. "I can see many airline companies are starting, resuming or expanding network to India. Definitely, a key market (India) for the region and the rest of the world," he said.
According to him, the Indian market is huge and the demand is expected to be quite robust as long as the economics of flying within India and out of India does not changed drastically. "India as a market has got some unique factors like very high fuel prices because of taxes... but we do expect India to be robust in terms of demand," he added.