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Centre No To AP Flights From Begumpet
Posted by Pradeep Sadanapalli | April 15, 2008 | 416 views
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Loading ...After all the hype, Begumpet airport will remain shut for flights within Andhra Pradesh. Highlyplaced sources revealed that the civil aviation ministry has ruled this out for a variety of reasons. The proposal had been mooted informally by the state government after it was inundated with requests from public representatives, and the CM had also said so on the floor of the Assembly.
The first hurdle is that it violates the concession agreement signed by the ministry with the airport promoters, barring another airport within 150 km. But more importantly it would adversely hit the business at Shamshabad much more than what it seemed at first: That’s because most of the intra-state flights are inter-state flights!
For instance, Indian flight from Hyderabad to Tirupati is actually a Delhi-Tirupati flight via Hyderabad. “So where does the flight land? At Begumpet or Shamshabad? asked a source. Similarly, the Indian flight from Hyderabad-Visakhapatnam is actually a Mumbai-Visakhapatnam flight via Hyderabad. While the Air Deccan flight from Vijayawada to Hyderabad extends to Nagpur. “If all these flights are allowed to land at Begumpet, a significantly lesser number of flights will be left for Shamshabad,” the source said. He added: “If you go to Shamshabad, there is feeling of emptiness. The need of the hour is to ensure more traffic so that airport operations become viable. Traffic reduction is not the answer.”
It was for this very reason that the government had reduced sales tax on aviation fuel in AP. “This is to give impetus to airlines to bring more flights to Shamshabad if only to take advantage of the cheap fuel here,” he said.
Calculations reveal that if these inter-state flights hopping through Hyderabad are not given to Begumpet, then the potential number of flights from there will be so few that it would not justify the fixed costs on keeping a minimum number of security and other staff at the airport that have to be nevertheless maintained.
It is not known how the state government proposes to deal with this refusal by the Union ministry and whether it would come up with some fresh idea, including the one to keep it open for chartered flights. For this, it would have to use moral suasion with GMR to agree to this proposal because it violates the concession agreement.
SOURCES:
Times Of India
Topics: Public Concerns, Infrastructure |
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