KANNUR: Things are not that good at the Kannur Airport which was inaugurated with much fanfare, thinking that the development of North Malabar is giving wings to your dreams. Many flights are canceled and curtailed due to lack of passengers.

Air India Express’ Bengaluru service will be stopped from this month. Kannur-Bengaluru service of Air India Express has been stopped due to lack of passengers. It has been decided to stop the service after not getting even ten passengers a day. As part of this, the booking of flight tickets in the sector has been stopped.

Air India Express operated a daily service in the Bengaluru sector. However, when contacted the airport, it was heard that the service has been suspended for two weeks and it is not possible to say whether it will be resumed later. IndiGo operates two daily services to Bengaluru. This service is also in trouble due to lack of passengers.

Kannur International Airport has seen a decrease in the number of passengers due to the steep hike in the prices of air tickets. In some sectors it is three times more. As per the Airport Authority of India, 95,888 people traveled via Kannur airport in March 2024. Last year in March it was 1,14,292. A decrease of 18,404 people was seen.

The hike in ticket prices has also affected non-residents. One had to spend Rs 60,500 to reach Kannur from Jeddah in March. This month also there has been no significant reduction in the rates. The ticket price was Rs 55,000 on April 2 and Rs 50,000 on April 10. Rates have also increased in Riyadh and Kuwait sector.

Indigo’ Kannur-Mumbai service has been reduced to four days a week due to lack of passengers. There is a shortfall of about 4,000 passengers a month in the domestic sector as well due to the curtailment of the schedule. Passengers are expected to increase with Air India Express starting more services in May.