Indira Gandhi is India's busiest airport.
According to recent reports, by 2024, Indians are expected to spend over $42 billion a year on international travel.
India is experiencing what Agoda CEO Omri Morgenshtern calls a travel “boom” and is now the “largest growing outbound destination.”
A series of bold investments
Much of India's outbound tourism growth trajectory is being driven by infrastructure improvements and expansion in the aviation sector, experts say.
The Indian government this year announced plans to spend 980 billion rupees ($11.9 billion) by 2025 to build and modernize domestic airports.
Among them is Noida International Airport in the city of Jewar in Uttar Pradesh. The airport, which is set to open in 2024, is poised to become Asia’s largest airport and will enhance connectivity to and from the greater Delhi National Capital Region (NCR) and Western Uttar Pradesh.
“The work that India is doing domestically is starting to pay off,” said Gary Bowerman, founder of Check-in Asia, a travel research and marketing firm. “It has more airports, more terminals, more infrastructure than it did a decade ago.”
Since 2017, at least 73 airports have been launched under India’s regional connectivity plan. Meanwhile, Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport has entered the list of the world’s 10 busiest international airports for the first time, with 59.5 million passengers in 2022.
Indian airlines increase purchases of new aircraft, conditions to help increase overseas passenger growth
Morgenshtern said the increase in outbound tourism from India was a result of investment not only by the government but also by private airlines.
With the merger and consolidation of airlines under the Tata umbrella, Air India is now the country's second largest domestic airline and the largest international airline.
The airline has made other moves to facilitate growth in Indian tourism. In February, Air India bought nearly 500 new aircraft, the most ever ordered by an airline in a single order. Over the past two years, the airline has also increased frequencies on existing routes and added several new routes to major destinations in Europe and the US.
Air India isn’t the only airline stepping up its game. Earlier in June, low-cost carrier Indigo announced the addition of 174 new weekly flights and six new destinations across Africa and Asia.
To meet the growing demand for air travel, India has also expanded its aircraft leasing program for both domestic and international routes.
To attract more Indian tourists, Morgenshtern suggested that countries should ease visa restrictions and increase the number of flights from India. “When those two things are done, miracles happen in a growing market like India,” he said.
Which country benefits?
Based on data collected by Agoda, Indians are now traveling to a wider range of countries than before. "If you look at European destinations, you'll see more Indians going to France or Switzerland. Those are two countries that weren't in the top 10 destinations for Indians before the pandemic," Morgenshtern told CNN .
In 2019, the three most popular destinations for Indians were Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. When it comes to Southeast Asia, the top countries Indians visit today are about the same as they were five years ago, but the number of tourists has increased.
Tourists stroll the ancient town at night in Hoi An, Vietnam, where an Indian tourist boom is expected.
“We are seeing more and more Indians coming to Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia. All of these countries had Indian tourists before but not to the extent that we are seeing now,” Morgenshtern said.
For example, Indian tourists to Vietnam are expected to increase by at least 1,000% compared to pre-pandemic levels, according to Morgenshtern.
Southeast Asia as a whole is clearly the top destination for Indian travelers. By contrast, based on Agoda data, not many Indians travel to Japan, South Korea or Taiwan, partly because they are far from India.
However, according to Mr Morgenshtern: "When we talk to tourism agencies of countries, they recognise India as a growing power and all have some plans. But when it comes to promoting destinations to Indian customers, they are "just starting".
Vietnam tourism once expected Indian tourists to replace Chinese tourists and implemented many destination promotion programs to attract visitors from the world's most populous country. However, up to now, in the statistics of international tourist markets to Vietnam by the General Department of Tourism, there is no data on Indian tourists.
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