India's Civil Aviation Minister notes unprecedented growth of aviation, LCC exceeds 70% domestically

India's Minister of Civil Aviation Ajit Singh stated (09-Oct-2012) air transport in India has witnessed unprecedented growth in the recent past. During the last 10 years, the compounded annual growth rate of passenger traffic has been approximately 15%. He noted a "key trend in the business model of the Indian Carriers in the domestic operations is that domestic traffic is rapidly shifting to Low Cost Carrier model". From a level of around 1% in 2003-2004, the market share of LCC including the LCC arm of full service carriers is today exceeding 70% of the total domestic traffic. In terms of current traffic, Mr Singh reported a 5.4% year-on-year increase international traffic in the eight months to Aug-2012 to 23.3 million. However, domestic traffic remained stable in the period, at 39.82 million passengers, compared to 39.63 million in the eight months to Aug-2011. He added aviation has been identified as "one of the most important growth engines essential for the fast economic growth of the country, besides providing air transport for passengers and goods". [more - original PR]