Odisha expects international tag for city airport by 2013

The Odisha government expects the Biju Patnaik airport in the city to be upgraded to an international airport by 2013.

“The Centre has assured that the Biju Patnaik airport will be declared an international airport by 2013,” said Patnaik.

The state government has been persistently demanding international status for the city airport.

During his recent meeting with civil aviation minister Ajit Singh in New Delhi, Patnaik pointed out that Odisha still remained deprived of international operations despite attracting a rush of investment proposals across sectors. Total investments proposed in Odisha in calendar 2011 stood at Rs 3.21 lakh crore, the highest among all states.

 

Patnaik had also stressed upon the need to provide adequate infrastructural support to the aviation sector in the state to ensure unhindered industrialisation and also keeping in view the growing inflow in domestic as well as international tourists.

Besides, Patnaik had pitched for air connectivity between Bhubaneswar and West Asian as well as South-East Asian nations while reiterating his demand for declaring the Biju Patnaik airport in the city as an international airport.

The Union minister had assured the Odisha chief minister that all necessary steps are being taken to upgrade Biju Patnaik domestic airport into an international airport at the earliest.

International airline operators like Fly Dubai and Air Asia had evinced interest in running their flight operations to and from the city, realizing the growing importance of Bhubaneswar as an important business destination. Work on a new domestic terminal at the city airport was nearing completion.

Following the commissioning of the new terminal, the Bhubaneswar airport would have an overall passenger handling capacity of 1.93 million per year. It would also have the capacity to handle 20 outgoing and 20 incoming flights every day. Passenger traffic at this airport has witnessed a year-on-year growth of12.81 per cent in 2007-08, 9.67 per cent in 2008-09 and 31.01 per cent in 2009-10.