Coimbatore, Dec. 6:
The Union Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh has voiced support to the
demand of industries in Coimbatore region for enhanced airline operations to
and from Coimbatore airport. It was recently made an international airport.
He also assured infrastructure improvements of the airport would be
carried out.
Speaking to Business
Line from
New Delhi after meeting the Civil Aviation Minister today, R.R. Balasundharam,
President, Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ICCI), Coimbatore, said
during his interaction with the ICCI team, the Minister expressed his support
for providing greater connectivity from Coimbatore to other cities both within
and outside India.
He wanted the chamber to take up the issue with concerned airline
companies and the Civil Aviation Ministry would back the request.
Balasundharam, who was accompanied by the ICCI Vice-President
(Infrastructure) D. Nandakumar, pointed out that the airport at Peelamedu in
Coimbatore suffered from infrastructure bottlenecks and that connectivity was
inadequate. He urged the Minister to accelerate the expansion programme of and
the number of cargo flights from the city should be increased so that exporters
from the region were not made to go to Kochi, Chennai or Tiruchi.
In his memorandum to Civil Aviation Minister, he also wanted the
inclusion of Coimbatore under bilateral agreements for unrestricted operations.
He said in the South, barring Coimbatore, all other airports (non-metro
airports) such as Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi, Kozhikode, Tiruchi and Vizag were
listed in bilateral agreements to get more international connections. This
gesture should be extended to Coimbatore also.
He wanted operation of international flights to West Asia with onward
connections to Europe and North America and introduction of daily flights to
Dubai. The present tri-weekly service of Silk Air to Singapore should be made a
daily service and the Air Arabia flight to Sharjah should be enhanced from five
times a week to daily service. Besides Kuala Lumpur, Colombo, Kuwait and should
be linked to the city.
He urged improvement to airport infrastructure such as providing in-line
baggage checks (skipping pre-check in x-ray scanners), adding more immigration
and customs and security check counters and provision of escalators, lifts and
moving walkways in the airport to ease movement of people within the airport.
(The expansion of the Coimbatore airport is held up because of the delay
in land acquisition due to opposition from the public because a significant
portion of the proposed acquisition covered areas that are thickly populated).
http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/todays-paper/tp-others/tp-states/ajit-singh-supports-plea-for-greater-air-connectivity-to-coimbatore/article4172048.ece
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