KOCHI: Cochin international airport has registered an increase of 20 per cent in passenger traffic through the airport in the last fiscal compared to the previous fiscal. A total of 77 lakh passengers travelled through the airport in both domestic and international sectors together in the 2015-16 financial year.
During the 2014-15 financial year, a total of 64,27,972 passengers entered and exited through the airport which grew to 77,70,785 in 2015-16. The aircraft movement in 2015-16 was at 57,762 times which is up 10 percent from last time.
The number of domestic passengers increased from 26.82 lakh to 31.29 lakh while that of international passengers shot up from 37.45 lakh to 46.41 lakh. The increase in the percentage of domestic passengers was 16.66 while in the international sector it was 23.92 percent compared to the previous fiscal.
“CIAL has scaled to these heights from five lakh passengers in the inception year of the airport in 1999. The number of passengers has gone up 15 times in over 15 years. CIAL could give a dividend to shareholders since the 2003-04 financial year. With the dividend distributed in 2014-15, the total dividend has come to 153 percent. The turnover of the company was '413.96 crore while profit was Rs 144.57 crore in 2014-15 financial year. The figures for 2015-16 will be available soon,” said a senior CIAL official.
A total of 24 airlines currently operate from the airport and in the summer schedule this year, a total of two services will be added in the domestic sector and one in the international sector. Thai AirAsia is the new international carrier operating service while in the domestic sector, Vistara and Air Pegasus will operate new services.
