The Air Asia authorities on Monday visited the Biju Patnaik International Airport here to check its infrastructure and facilities and held discussion with Chief Secretary GC Pati and the airport authorities to check the commercial viability of flight operations. Speaking to the media, Airport Director Sharad Kumar termed the meeting as ‘very fruitful’ even though he did not say definitely whether the Air Asia would indeed start operations from Bhubaneswar.
On Sunday, the airport authorities had said that the Air Asia wants to use the airport for connecting to over 100 destinations, including some in Germany, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan and South Korea. “We had a very good meeting with the Air Asia representatives, tour and travel operators and the Government authorities and deliberated upon the need for international operations from the airport. They will start their operations from Bhubaneswar, if they manage to get the required traffic here. After all, it boils down to commercial viability. Any airline would do this to ensure that the routes remain profitable,” said Kumar.
“The State Government is extending all possible support and we are doing our best. The Chief Secretary, the Principal Secretary of GA Department and the Secretary of Tourism Department were present at the meeting and were very cooperative. They have agreed to waive the VAT from aviation turbine fuel (ATF) for flights. This has already been very helpful in increasing the domestic frequencies to 20 flights a day from 11-12 earlier,” he added.