Eid rush leads to soaring air ticket price
Monirul Hasan, who works at a private organisation, had planned to go to his village home for Eid by air to avoid the hassle of a time-consuming journey by road and railway.
But Monirul was forced to abandon his plan. Even after trying for two days, he did not see a ticket that was within his budget.
Like Monirul, many holidaymakers could not get air tickets due to the high price or unavailability.
Apart from domestic routes, demand for air tickets for popular holiday destinations -- especially the Maldives, Dubai, Singapore, Thailand and India -- have increased right before Eid holidays.
The country will enjoy a holiday for five days -- from April 19 to April 23. If Eid is celebrated on April 23, people will get six days of holiday.
Sources at different airlines said the extended holiday has prompted people to take aerial routes for tourist destinations with their near and dear ones.
Sources at the country's four airlines -- Biman, US-Bangla, Novoair and Air Astra -- said tickets for domestic and outbound tourist destinations have become scarce due to the ongoing rush of holidaymakers.
Different airlines are counting profits, they said, adding that holidaymakers nowadays prefer travelling by air to avoid extra trouble.
"Almost all tickets on Saidpur, Jashore, Rajshahi and Barishal routes before five to six days of Eid day have already sold out," Kamrul Islam, spokesperson of US-Bangla Airlines, told The Daily Star.
Ticket prices on the routes have increased by around two to three times due to the high demand.
Tickets to different international destinations -- including India, Nepal, Thailand, Malaysia and Maldives -- have also been booked or sold out for that period, said the sources.
Demand for air tickets for Cox's Bazar, a popular holiday destination, is also very high, Kamrul said.
"Improvement in people's financial condition as well as competitive and reasonable prices of air tickets have considerably boosted domestic and international air traffic," he said.
Kamrul said ticket prices are high as the price of jet fuel kept rising for the last one and a half years.
He said people who have bought tickets one or two months ago, got them at the regular prices. But as there are limited seats left now, prices shot up accordingly.
A Biman official, wishing anonymity, said, "It's not true that we are increasing prices targeting Eid. It's a normal trend in the aviation sector across the globe, that prices shoot up when demand is high."
According to Kazi Wahidul Alam, an aviation expert, the number of domestic air passengers has increased by about 64.73 percent in the country in the last five years since 2019.
Tour Operators Association of Bangladesh (Toab) said according to its estimate, around 15 lakh holidaymakers are likely to go on a trip to different domestic tourist destinations this Eid.