Local Congress MLA Naba Kishore Das, along with his supporters, continued sitting on a dharna in front of the Veer Surendra Sai Airport for a consecutive second day on Wednesday demanding flight operations from Jharsuguda to Raipur, Bhubaneswar and Kolkata at the earliest.
“Rising above party lines, we had lent all support to the Prime Minister in inauguration of the airport here as the latter assured that flight operations would continue from the Jharsuguda to many cities of the country. However, flight operations have been stopped since its inauguration,” the MLA lamented, saying that the Congress would expedite agitation in November if flight operation doesn’t resume at least to and fro Jharsuguda to Raipur, Bhubaneswar and Kolkata.
He said he has been in touch with senior officials of the Ministry of Civil Aviation and the Airport Authority of India (AAI), but in vain. He has written missives to the Civil Aviation Secretary Rajiv Nayan Choubey, Jointy Secretary Usha Padhee and AAI Chairman Guru Prasad Mahapatra to fly Air India Flights from Jharsuguda.
Das had also met the Prime Minister’s Additional Principal Secretary PK Mishra, the AAI Chairman and Chief Secretary AP Padhi many times.
He has also written to Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to initiate talks with MoCA for starting regular flights.
Notably, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had inaugurated the newly built airport on September 22, 2018 and promised that flight operations would continue from Jharsuguda to many other cities under the Ude Desh Ki Aam Nagarik (UDAN) scheme.
Meanwhile, Airport Director Suresh Kumar Chouhan has told the media that the Air Odisha had operated flights on the Bhubaneswar-Jharsuguda-Raipur route only six days flight services have been stopped for the past 15 days.”