IndiGo CEO expects recovery in domestic traffic by December

IndiGo CEO Ronjoy Dutta said on Monday that the domestic carrier expects domestic air travel to recover by Q3 (October-December quarter) of FY22. On Saturday, IndiGo posted a net loss of Rs 1,147.2 crore in the quarter ended 31 March 2021.

New Delhi: India's largest domestic carrier IndiGo expects domestic air travel to recover by Q3 (October-December quarter) of FY22, airline CEO Ronjoy Dutta said on Monday. Speaking to analysts during a post result call, IndiGo CEO Ronjoy Dutta said that IndiGo expects to return to the February 2021 levels by the third quarter (October-December) of the current fiscal year while we expect a longer recovery period for international travel to the fiscal fourth quarter (January-March, 2022).

On Saturday, IndiGo posted a net loss of Rs 1,147.2 crore in the quarter ended 31 March 2021. The airline had posted a loss of Rs 870.8 crore during the same quarter a year earlier and Rs 620 crore in the previous quarter. IndiGo CFO Jiten Chopra told analysts that the company has plans to raise up to 30 billion rupees (Rs 3,000 crore) as disaster risk insurance. He said that the average net cash burn of the airline increased from INR 150 million rupees in the December quarter, to INR 190 million rupees per day in the March quarter.

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The airline CEO said he is hopeful that with the reducing trend in Covid cases and accelerated vaccine programme, passengers confidence and airline traffic will gain momentum. In view of the surge in active Covid-19 cases across the country, the government had recently decided to reduce the maximum passenger capacity for domestic airlines to 50 per cent from 80 per cent.

Speaking on the issue, Dutta said that the airline had objected to fair bands and capacity restrictions. "Looking ahead in July we were scheduling 50 per cent of our capacity. We are going up a limit and again, we have written to the ministry that they would like to go higher. We hope that government will remove capacity restrictions by July 31," he added.

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