Air traffic between the UAE and India is hitting new highs every day after the authorities lifted the travel ban for select categories of passengers earlier this month, with the travel industry reporting about a 45 percent spike in daily bookings.
Outbound travel from the UAE to various Indian cities is witnessing the maximum demand due to the twin effect of pent up demand from expat Indians to visit their home country and the continued ban for travel on tourist visas.
“There is a noticeable increase in traffic from South Asia to the UAE, but the largest increase has been from the UAE to India,” Atish Thapa, business head – Middle East at Cleartrip, told Arabian Business.
“As customers are not permitted to call [to the UAE] their loved ones on tourist visas, we have seen an increase in outbound travel from the UAE to India,” added the senior executive of Cleartrip, a leading online travel aggregator operating in the Middle East and India.
“In terms of volume, we have seen a spike of almost 45 percent in daily bookings,” Thapa said.
Thapa, however, said it was difficult to talk about the long-term trend in flight bookings in the UAE-India sector as most of the bookings currently are done on a near-term travel basis.
“We still see people book their flights less than eight days before departure,” Thapa said.
The Cleartrip senior executive also said Delhi, Mumbai and Kochi are three top routes which are seeing a significant increase in demand for travel from the UAE.
“Approximately 60 percent of all bookings are on these routes, and 75 percent are one-way bookings,” he said.
Delhi, Mumbai and Kochi are three top routes which are seeing a significant increase in demand for travel from the UAE, Thapa said.
Under the eased travel regulations, the UAE has allowed entry to residency visa holders and certain other categories of travellers such as healthcare and education sector professionals, students and exhibitors and participants at Dubai Expo 2020.
Flights between India and the UAE are currently operated as special services under a bilateral ‘air bubble’ arrangement, as the regular, scheduled commercial flight operations from and to India are currently banned until the end of August.
Industry executives in India also confirmed the surge in demand for travel between the two countries, especially from various Indian cities to Dubai – the all-time favourite transit hub for Indian passengers.
“A large part of air traffic between India and the UAE currently is for transit travel through Dubai and the UAE airlines such as Emirates are getting full advantage of it, as Indian airlines carry only passengers bound for the UAE,” Amit Udani, executive director at Fly Aerolink Travel, a leading Mumbai-based travel services agency, told Arabian Business.
“Some of the flights of the UAE airline from Mumbai to Dubai – the flights which are well suited for connecting flights for onward journeys – are almost fully booked till September 10,” Udani said.
Air traffic between India and the UAE currently is for transit travel through Dubai and the UAE airlines such as Emirates are getting full advantage of it.
Travel firm executives, however, said although there is a steady and significant rise in demand for travel in the India-Dubai sector, the massive surge in airfares witnessed for travel in the immediate days after the ban from India was lifted has eased up due to the increased number of flights.
“The first week of August saw a two-time (2X) spike in airfares due to low capacity and high intent to travel, but prices have decreased over the last few days, and now airfares are [only] marginally higher compared with the usual trend,” Thapa said.
Arabian Business has earlier reported that a one-way ticket to Dubai from cities such as Delhi, Mumbai and Kochi was priced in the range of $470-$612 for travel in the midweek of August, more than double than what they used to be in the pre-flight ban days.
Meanwhile, Indian carrier IndiGo has confirmed that it will recommence flight operations between India and the UAE on Thursday evening after what was described as “operational issues”.
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