Fifty-seven passengers commuted between Hyderabad-Hubballi-Hyderabad in the inaugural flight of Alliance Air, which restarted its flight service between the two cities on Wednesday.
Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi received the 70 seater ATR 72 600 flight, which arrived at Hubballi Airport from Hyderabad (9I 879) at 8:00 am. And the return flight (9I 880) with 28 passengers took off from Hubballi at 8:25 am and reached Hyderabad at 9:55 am.
Currently, Alliance Air, a subsidiary of Air India, is providing three days in a week service: Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Speaking on the occasion, Joshi said that the flight service between these two cities was a long pending demand, which has been fulfilled after the intervention of Minister of Civil Aviation Hardeep Singh Puri. Based on the response received for the flight and seat occupancy, Alliance Airways is ready to operate a daily flight between Hubballi and Hyderabad, he said.
The union minister also said that there is also demand for establishing air connectivity between Hubballi and Mangaluru, which will be soon fulfilled. Hubballi currently has flight services to Hindon (Delhi), Bengaluru, Tirupati, Kannur, Ahmedabad, Cochin, Mumbai, Chennai and Goa. Nearly 13 flights operate from here and on average 25,000 passengers either take off or land here in a month.
Joshi said Hubballi Airport has the facilities to operate flights at night. By extending the runway and setting up the required infrastructure the Hubballi Airport director can send a proposal to the Union government to upgrade the airport to handle international flights, especially those from Middle East countries.
Alliance Air Chief Executive Officer Harpreet A De Singh said Hubballi is one of the important airports for us. The flight between Hubballi and Hyderabad will bring business and commerce between Karnataka and Telangana closer. She said currently, Alliance Air is operating flight service from Mysuru, Kalaburagi and Mangaluru in Karnataka. And soon we wish to connect Karnataka with the North Eastern States.
She said that under the ‘Make-in India’ we have signed a memorandum of understanding with Hindustan Aeronautics Limited to purchase passenger aircraft.
Deputy Commissioner Nitesh Patil, Hubballi Airport Director Pramod Kumar Thakre, Airport Security Officer Jagadish Hanchinal, and others were present.
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