New Delhi: The Centre allowed Tuesday airlines to deploy full pre-Covid flight capacity on the domestic sector from October 18. The capacity will be raised to 100 per cent from 85 per cent, which was set by the Civil Aviation Ministry September 18, 2021, up from 72.5 per cent allowed in August and 65 per cent in July.
“After review of the current status of scheduled domestic operations vis-a-vis passenger demand for air travel in terms of the purpose specified in the initial order it has been decided to restore the scheduled domestic operations with effect from 18.10.2021 (October 18, 2021) without any capacity restriction,” the Civil Aviation Ministry said in the order issued Tuesday.
The domestic aviation sector was reopened on May 25, 2020 with a limited capacity of 33 per cent. Since then, the operational capacity has only been increased in consonance with rising passenger traffic.
In the first phase of Covid-19 infections last year, domestic airlines were asked to suspend operations for a little over two months as per the government’s directive. Passenger services were shut down to prevent the spread of Covid-19.
