‘Civil Aviation team to find suitable land for airport in Itanagar’

Itanagar: Union Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju has agreed to depute a team of officer from the Centre for site visit to start work for civilian airport in the state capital of Arunachal Pradesh.
This was disclosed by the Union Minister when Chief Minister Kalikho Pul took up the issue of poor air connectivity and other crucial proposals in the state with Raju in Delhi on Friday, Chief Minister’s office informed here.
The Chief Minister stressed that the air connectivity offers itself as the only viable alternative and the most obvious candidate for serious planning and investment as the state does not have a wide rail network or waterways.
There are places in the state not connected by roads that makes communication a major constraint for development,” pointed the Chief Minister.
Impressing upon the urgency to establish a civilian airport at Itanagar, the Chief Minister said, “It is a great irony that we are today perhaps the only state in the entire country, which does not have a functional civilian airport with any commercial airline operations”.
He said, the matter of a civilian airport for state capital has been hanging for long and need to quickly move into implementation at a location, which is logistically most convenient and cost effective.
In absence of air connectivity, the development of the state has been getting hampered, the Chief Minister pointed.
In the interim, the Chief Minister urged that Air India/Alliance Air should commence regular flights to Lakhimpur and Tezpur thrice a week.
The state government, through NEC support, would enter into a viability gap funding agreement with the airlines and would prescribe a subsidised fare and the gap for operational cost would be met through NEC support. (UNI)