'Restore Saudi Airlines flights for Telangana, Andhra pilgrims'

The Congress has urged the central government to ensure that Saudi Airlines flights are arranged for the pilgrims of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh during Haj 2015, a party leader said on Wednesday.

The party's Telangana unit vice president Mohammed Ali Shabbir said the Congress' central leadership of the party has written a letter to the central government in this regard.

On a request made by Shabbir, party chief Sonia Gandhi asked party leaders to pursue the matter with the ministries concerned.

General secretary Digvijay Singh wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking his intervention to restore Saudi Airlines flights for pilgrims of the two states. The Congress leaders are also pursuing the matter with union ministers for civil aviation and external affairs and other departments concerned.

Shabbir said that since the beginning of direct flights from Hyderabad in 2001, the pilgrims of the then undivided state of Andhra Pradesh have been flying to the holy cities of Makkah and Madinah by Saudi Airlines. This continued till Haj 2014.

However, this year the Haj Committee of India has reportedly finalised Air India flights for the pilgrims of both the states, which will begin from August 17, 2015. Besides delayed operations, the Haj passengers of Air India face several difficulties at the airports, especially after landing in Saudi Arabia.

Since some special privileges have been given to Saudi Airlines at Saudi airports, the Haj pilgrims find it convenient and prefer to travel by their flights, Shabbir added.