Mumbai airport sees growth in passenger movement as government resumes international flights

Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA) is witnessing a growth in passenger movement, with Dubai being the top destination, followed by Abu Dhabi and Singapore.

Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport

After international borders were reopened and regular international flights were resumed, Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA) had roughly 6.3 lakh passenger movement in just one month. Mumbai Airport saw almost 120 daily movements to a total of 41 overseas destinations from March 27th to April 27th, 2022.

Around 2.8 lakh foreign passengers arrived in the first month, with around 3.5 lakh international passengers departing from CSMIA. With over 1.62 lakh passengers travelling in a month, Dubai took first place as a destination. With 0.43 lakh and 0.40 lakh passengers moving through the CSMIA, Abu Dhabi and Singapore were rated second and third, respectively.

For the same time period, a total of 3720 movements to the international routes was observed. IndiGo, Air India and Emirates emerged as the top airlines catering to the highest international passenger traffic to and from CSMIA.

Pre-pandemic, of the total 51 international destinations for which CSMIA catered to, 44.8% were Middle Eastern countries, 25.8% Asia Pacific countries, 20% were European countries, 5.9% to African countries and 3.5% America based destinations.

Moreover, CSMIA also flagged off its summer schedule on March 27 with approx. 5000 weekly domestic & international flights. This new schedule is set to see an increase of 111% over the operating roster of FY21 from CSMIA. CSMIA's summer schedule is curated to suit the growing traffic, with almost a 70% rise in the number of flights compared to approx. 418 daily traffic schedule of 2021.

From 27th March 2022, all international passengers are required to show only their vaccination certificates to travel internationally, while those without a double vaccination certificate would require a negative RTPCR test report taken not less than 72 hours before boarding the flight. Whereas passengers departing from Mumbai will continue to abide by the norms laid down by the destination country.