Holidayers cash in on festive spirit, discounts

MUMBAI: Seven in 10 Indians who responded to a travel survey said they would like to travel during the festive season.

MUMBAI: Seven in 10 Indians who responded to a travel survey said they would like to travel during the festive season.

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A Yatra.com survey that covered more than 5,000 people found that a majority of them have packed their bags for a holiday between Navratri and Diwali.

The survey also found that 60% of these holidays were booked on credit card and almost one-third of the respondents had a budget of more than Rs50,000 for each member of the family.

“Going on vacations in the festive months seems to have become the norm among Indian travellers. With Durga Puja, Navratri, Dussehra and Diwali on the horizon, we have observed an increase in leisure travel, reflected by improvement in passenger loads on flights to beach and hill destinations,” said Sharat Dhall, president, Yatra.com.

He added that many families are also opting for vacations to foreign destinations courtesy the stable value of the Rupee.

Four out of 10 respondents picked Europe as the preferred destination followed by US (19.3%) and Dubai (12.8%).

Frequent flash sales by domestic airlines and generous discounts in stay had a role in whipping up bookings, claimed the survey.

For instance, the minimum one-way economy fares on the Mumbai-Goa route was Rs1,341 for bookings made 21 days before travel.

The same journey cost Rs1,616, last Navratri, stated a comparative study by travel portal Ixigo.com.

“It is generally observed that the days leading to the holidays see a considerable increase in airfares which is not the case this year. All leading airlines including Indigo, Jet Airways, Go Air, SpiceJet, an others, are running good discounts on regular fares,” said Aloke Bajpai, chief executive officer and co-founder of Ixigo.com.

With two back-to- back public holidays on account of Dusshera (Tuesday) and Muharram on Wednesday, the long weekend between October 8 and 13 has increased the rush in travel.

“We are witnessing a huge demand for hotel bookings and car rentals from Mumbai and Pune, from people headed to Ahmedabad and Baroda to celebrate Navaratri. Bookings for West Bengal and Odisha have surged by 20% this year with families headed for Durga Puja,” said Neelu Singh, chief executive officer and director, Ezeego1, a travel portal.