Flight connectivity policy for small cities

 The Centre plans to soon put in place a new regional air connectivity policy aimed at providing air service to more than 100 small cities in the country.According to Union Civil Aviation secretary K N Shrivatsa, the policy would encourage airline companies to use smaller aircraft to provide services to Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities.

MoU on upgradation

Briefing reporters on the sidelines of signing the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for upgrading the Hubli airport on Wednesday, he said reasonable air fare would be fixed for smaller cities, and to compensate this subsidisation, extra cess would be imposed on routes between metros.

Further, he said, there was a plan to provide air connectivity to all district headquarters and make the existing airports operational.

Steps would also be taken to make operations of airline companies in small cities profitable, he said.

More flights

Spicejet flights are operating on the Hubli-Bangalore route. Air India and Indigo airlines may soon operate from Hubli. Though smaller aircraft are not allowed at the Mumbai airport, attempts would be made to get space for the Mumbai-Hubli flights, Shrivatsa said.

Airports Authority of India (AAI) chairman V P Agrawal and State Infrastructure Development Department principal secretary Amita Prasad signed the MoU for upgrading the Hubli airport at a cost Rs 145 crore.
The State government has provided 600 acres of land to AAI for free.

Agrawal said the airport upgrading work would be completed within 30 months, so that Airbus 320s could land there.