India wants five big airlines — but even two are barely staying afloat
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The big story
Last month, Indian airports descended into chaos as hundreds of flights were cancelled by the country’s largest airline, Indigo, upending travel plans for thousands of passengers.
Its closest competitor, Air India, has been dealing with troubles of its own. In 2025, one of its London-bound planes crashed in a tragic accident, killing all but one of its 242 passengers on board. And more recently, Canadian authorities ordered the airline to investigate a pilot who failed two breathalyzer tests before a scheduled departure.
The Tata Group, which owns Air India alongside Singapore Airlines, is reportedly considering replacing Chief Executive Campbell Wilson to accelerate the airline’s turnaround.
An Indigo Airlines plane approaches Ahmedabad airport, India
Sam Panthaky | AFP | Getty Images
A two-cornered fight
Indigo commands nearly 65% of market share in India, while Air India holds about 27%, according to data from the country’s aviation regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation. That leaves India’s airline industry effectively a duopoly.
India is already one of the world’s fastest-growing aviation markets, though estimates of the size vary depending on how passenger trips are counted. The government says Indian airlines carried about 350 million passengers in 2024, a figure that includes multiple trips by the same traveler.
By contrast, passenger traffic totaled 174.1 million, according to a June 2025 report by the International Air Transport Association, which measures origin-destination travel. The government expects total passenger numbers to rise to 1.1 billion by 2040.
Speaking in parliament on Dec. 8, India’s civil aviation minister Kinjarapu Rammohan Naidu said the country has the demand to sustain “five big airlines,” adding that his government wants more players in this industry and that it is the “best time to start an airline in India.”
Industry experts are not convinced.
Adding new airlines, they argue, will not resolve structural issues, such as the cost and revenue pressures specific to Indian airlines.
A brutal market
More than a decade ago, India had a vibrant aviation sector, with multiple carriers engaging in fierce competition. Many, however, were unable to sustain because of mounting costs and eventually became overburdened with debt.
“In the last three decades in India, many big players like Jet Airways, Kingfisher, Sahara Airlines, Deccan, GoAir, ModiLuft, and many other closed down after incurring heavy losses,” said Jayant Krishna, senior fellow with the Chair on India and Emerging Asia Economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Indigo, he said, managed to last by sticking rigidly to a low-cost model, remaining lean. That discipline eventually helped it to capture two-thirds of the market.
Air India’s path was…
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