No takers as yet for Kadapa airport

Anantapur: Air travel to Rayalaseema is still a distant dream. Though Kadapa airport recently opened for operation of flights it was stopped on reasons of poor response from passengers between Kadapa-Bengaluru.

Bengaluru based Air Pegasus had launched a flight between Bengaluru and Kadapa, its third destination after Hubli and Thiruvananthapuram on June 7. Civil aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju and CM N. Chandrababu Naidu had formally launched the operations. Operation of aircrafts was ann-ounced through Kadapa airport on one sector with few flights on every Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday.

But, they agency stopp-ed operations since 45 days due to poor demand of passengers. Reports reveal the aircraft had capacity of 72 passeng-ers but had no more th-an an average of 20 passengers for many trips incurring losses for the agency. The Kadapa airport authorities however say that operation of aircrafts would begin in a month. M. Krishan, a contractor from Puliven-dula area observed people should know about all the facilities to attract people.

“An average of 500 passengers from Kadapa district are travelling to Hyderabad every day and aircrafts should fly between Hyderabad-Kadapa,” he said.

Kadapa in south-west AP has a strong mining, agricultural and industrial economy. It is poorly connected to Bengaluru and Hyderabad by rail. Travel time was about 50 minutes to the Karnataka state capital.

The airport was constructed in 1953, and initially had a 3,500 ft runway. In 2009, a new 6,562 ft Ã-150 ft runway was completed under the Bu-ild, Operate and Transf-er (BOT) basis at a cost of Rs 21 crore. In addition, an 11-km long compound wall was constructed with an outlay of Rs 24 cr-ore and also an ATC building, passenger terminal, parking bays and internal roads were built at a cost of Rs 13 crore.

Other facilities were developed at an estimated cost of Rs 8 crore. Further, proposals are pending for long to take over Puttaparti airport in Anantapur district for cargo. Puttaparti airport had no night landing facility and used mainly by VIPs and only a few Saibaba devotees with private jets.