Chennai lags behind Bengaluru in domestic flyer footfall

CHENNAI: The city airport's domestic passenger numbers may be increasing but it is still lagging way behind Bengaluru. While Chennai has handled around 5.6lakh passengers, the Bengaluru airport has handled around 14lakh domestic passengers in the last 100days since services resumed in the last week of May.
The airlines too operated more flights from Bengaluru, connecting almost 49 cities. However, Chennai has flights only to 18 cities.
AAI statistics show that Chennai airport handled 2,62,640 arriving passengers (2979 aircraft movements) and 2,98,359 departing passengers (2981 aircraft movement). An airport official said footfall and aircraft movement when compared to Bengaluru was low because of the restrictions in the total number of flights imposed by the state government, strict quarantine rules and ban on inter-district travel. "There was a lot of confusion among passengers on the e-pass and travel and quarantine restrictions. The restrictions was well-placed but it affected passenger movement. A lot of people use Chennai as a gateway airport and travel by road to nearby districts. Since that was restricted, people did not fly to Chennai in the last three months."
In contrast, Karnataka had minimal restrictions on road transport within the state. "This made more people travel to Bengaluru. The numbers are going to increase more for Bengaluru because Karnataka has scrapped quarantine rules and has made entry without e-pass," said an airline official.
An AAI official said, "We could not allow more flights though airlines were lobbying to start more domestic services, including increase in frequency and new services. But it could not be allowed."
The number of flights has increased now after the state government has issued more relaxations. The airport will see close to 90flights for the first time on Thursday after three months. New city pairs like Chennai-Kolkata is being started this week.