Many passengers are reluctant to book IndiGo flights despite fares for the next few days being significantly lower than the steep prices of competing airlines, travel agents said.
Tour operators said that IndiGo closed new bookings for the coming three days on Friday but reopened the system for agents in the evening.
“IndiGo’s fare to Delhi was showing ₹20,000 for Saturday, and it was the same for Ahmedabad,” said Anjani Dhanuka, chairman of the Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI), eastern region. “However, many passengers were unwilling to buy tickets, fearing cancellations. They preferred booking other airlines even at almost double the fare,” he added.
Airfares further surged on the fourth day of IndiGo’s widespread cancellations.
One businessman, returning from Chandigarh to Calcutta, was initially booked on a 7pm IndiGo flight on Friday. When he learned in the morning that it had been deferred to 11.30pm, he feared it might be cancelled and instead booked an Air India business class ticket via Delhi for ₹60,000 one way.
Tour operators said that in many other airlines, only business class seats were available for the next few days on certain routes, while flights with multiple stopovers were being offered at exorbitant prices. For instance, an Air India flight from Delhi to Chennai with two stopovers at Hyderabad and Mumbai was listed at ₹1.08 lakh on Friday evening.
Due to the lack of available seats and high fares, many stranded passengers travelling in groups are hiring cars to reach their destinations.
A group of four from Raipur, stranded in Calcutta after their IndiGo flight was cancelled, hired a car for ₹50,000 to return home, while passengers stuck in Varanasi were spending around ₹25,000 each to reach Calcutta by road.
“The DGCA should intervene to curb airlines from artificially inflating fares,” said Anil Punjabi, chairman of the Travel Agents Federation of India (TAFI), eastern region.