The Maharashtra government’s decision to make coronavirus negative report mandatory for those entering the state from four certain states is expected to impact the domestic travel demand further, ratings agency Icra said on Tuesday. The varying policies of the states on capacity deployment by the airlines coupled with quarantine norms, among others, have already hit the domestic passenger traffic flow in the country, Icra said in a statement to PTI.
Despite month-on-month recovery in passenger volume since the reopening of the domestic scheduled flights in a graded manner from May 25 after a hiatus of two months, the air passenger traffic has seen a significant fall on a year-on-year basis. Domestic travel demand declined 58 per cent to 52 lakh passengers in October this year compared to 123 lakh passengers in the same month of last year, Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) data for October showed. “The state-wise varying policies in terms of capacity deployment allowed by the airlines, quarantine norms, etc. have already been an hindrance to the domestic passenger traffic flow in the country.
