IndiGo
IndiGo aircraftReuters

India's largest airline IndiGo's revenue rose by 28.1 per cent in Q3 year on year while its profit after tax for the period plunged 75 per cent on high fuel prices and currency depreciation, media reports say.

InterGlobe Aviation (IndiGo), which owns the budget carrier, rose to Rs 7,916.20 crore from Rs 6,177.90 year on year, according to media reports.

The profit after tax (PAT) in the December quarter is Rs 190.90 crore. The company had Rs 762-crore profit in the same period a year ago.

The company's shares were trading at Rs 1,154.35 early on Thursday, rising Rs 45.05 or 4.06 per cent over the previous day's close. The share is still far from the 52-week high of Rs 1,520 that it hit on April 20 last year. The 52- week low was at Rs 691 on October 9 last year.

Other incomes of the carrier rose 35.5 per cent year on year to Rs 313.10 crore, the company has said in a filing to the stock exchanges.

The profit before tax has also fallen to 2.4 per cent from 17.3 per cent in the same quarter last year.

The company's EBITDAR margin is 21.2 per cent for the December quarter, down from 32.4 per cent in the same quarter in the previous year, according to a report on the Economic Times website.

The company's debt rose 1.8 per cent to Rs 14,136.10 crore as of December 31, compared with Rs 13,887.40 crore at the end of the same quarter in the previous year. Its free cash fell 43 per cent to Rs 4,618.30 crore against Rs 8,097.80 crore in the year-ago quarter.

For the quarter, on-time performance was at 79.1 per cent, and technical dispatch reliability at 99.87 per cent while the flight cancellation rate was reported to be 0.45 per cent, the company statement said.

Meanwhile, the carrier has announced new flights to Istanbul from March. The airline is pursuing a plan for rapid international expansion this year, according to co-founder and interim CEO Rahul Bhatia.

"We have received our first A321 Neo, which has a higher seating capacity and lower unit costs compared to the A320 Neos and also has longer range. We plan to start direct flights to Istanbul from March and open other international destinations as the year progresses," Bhatia has been quoted as telling the MoneyControl website.

The A321 Neo has a flying time of six hours and will help the airline expand its international network, according to Bhatia. IndiGo currently flies to 15 overseas destinations apart from 49 domestic destinations.