Highest growth in "Air travelers" at Patna Airport

I like those news that give an indication of changes in Bihar. Therefore the news that for the 2nd year straight, Patna airport has witnessed the highest growth in air passengers traffic passing through the Patna airport, makes  me feel happy.

So for the year 2010-11, Patna airport again emerged No. 1 amongst 46 airports in the country in terms of the increase in the number of domestic aircraft movements and the number of passengers passing through it. Patna airport overtook the airports in the following cities in terms of total number of domestic passengers taking domestic flights in 2010-11

1. Port Blair (Andaman & Nicobar)
2. Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh)
3. Vadodra (Gujarat)
4. Raipur (Chattisgarh)
5. Agartala (Tripura)
6. Chandigarh (Chandigarh)
7. Madurai (Tamil Nadu)

The overall passengers travelling in and out of Patna by air has been growing increasingly over the last few years even though the Patna Airport is not considered very safe. The number of passengers that have traveled over the past few years and the percentage growth is listed below:

Year	No of Passengers handled	Percentage change over last year
2010-11	8.38 Lakhs	51.8%
2009-10	5.52 Lakhs	60.5%
2008-09	3.44 Lakhs
2004-05	1.76 Lakhs

The growth from the year 2004-05 when Nitish Kumar's government took over, until last year has been an astounding 376%.   Infact we see a growth month by month as I had captured in one of my posts in 2009 - "Flights of Prosperity"

As per data that is available for 2009-10, Amritsar airport was the next airport with the highest growth (51.8%)  in domestic passengers followed by Dibrugarh (47.4%).

Thus the growth in air passengers is a sign of increasing prosperity and improved law and order where more and more people are willing to travel and that to travel by air.

This and more details can be found in the India Today article "Patna airport emerges on top in passenger traffic growth"


Prashant
www.progressivebihar.com