Visakhapatnam: Stakeholders and Airport Authority of India (AAI) officials are hopeful that the new aviation policy on the anvil would bring in some relaxation in the rules by scrapping the old rules that would attract international air services to operate flights to Andhra Pradesh during the International Airlines Summit, organised by AP Chambers of Commerce and Industry Federation, AP Air Travellers Association and Tours and Travels association of AP here on Saturday.
The stateholders also highlighted some of the key issues on the prospects of improving the facilities at the major Airports in the state that would lead to the development of state by double digits. However, President of Indian Association of Tour Operators Subhash Goyal opined that unless the present traffic rights rules were changed it would not be viable for the new airline operators to make Vizag as destination.
Majority of the airline operators would assess the economic viability from the point of origin and destination point, but Vizag was not financially viable, Goyal added. He suggested that the government should promote the images of tourist destination in the state by opening up the skies doing away with the traffic rights and become at least a transit point for air services for the south East Asian countries.
Speaking at the occasion, Head of the Marketing, South of AAI, Tariq Hussain Butt said that the air services in the state has been growing and by 2020 over 2.41 million people would be flying in and out. India has free traffic flow agreement with 18 ASEAN and SAARC countries except for Philippines, Laos, Afghanistan and Pakistan, he added.
Regional Executive Director (Southern Region) of AAI, VV.G. Raju stated that 10 ATR aircraft would be introduced for regional operation in AP and of them 3 aircraft would be launched in June this year.
MP for international air cargo operations
Vizag MP K. Hari Babu expressed displeasure at the Airport Authority of India (AAI) officials not taken up serious steps to set up International Air Cargo Terminal at Vizag Airport.
While the regional executive director of Airports Authority of India (AAI) V.V.G. Raju was making a presentation on the cargo potential at Vizag during the International Airline summit here on Saturday, Mr Hari Babu interrupted his presentation and wondered what happened to international cargo terminal operations.
Mr Raju claimed that the tendering process was on for the international cargo terminal as so far no one has come forward. But, the MP was upset over the reply of Mr Raju for not completing the tendering process even after two years.
Though a Hyderabad-based firm had bagged the tender, it failed to start operations and later withdrew citing that international cargo operations were not feasible. The same contractor had bagged the tender for domestic cargo operations in Vizag and successfully operating them.
The MP has suggested the AAI officials to relax the norms to attract large number of contractors for international air cargo operations in Vizag. Some of the officials said that the proposed International Green-field Airport at Bhogapuram area in Vizianagaram district will have aviation academy.
