Union civil aviation minister Suresh Prabhu laid the foundation stone for a temporary civil enclave at Darbhanga recently. Prabhu said that regional flight operations under the civil aviation ministry’s flagship Udaan scheme would soon start at several places in the state such as Muzaffarpur, Raxaul and Jogbani.
First Airport in North Bihar
The Darbhanga airport will be named after the famous Maithili poet Vidyapati. The runway at the Darbhanga airport will be fit for even larger planes like the A-320 Airbus. The airport will be adorned with the world famous Mithila paintings which will give it a local flavour. The CMD of the private airline carrier SpiceJet, Ajay Singh, has assured the central government of operating 10 to 15 flights on a daily basis from the Darbhanga airport in the time to come.
Udaan Scheme and Its Implications for Bihar
At the venue, Ajay spelt out the vision for better air connectivity across smaller cities in India and bringing them under the aviation map. He said that at least 2300 more airports are needed for better air connectivity in India. The aircraft, which will be operated on these routes, will be manufactured in our country itself. Just like the establishment of the environment- friendly diesel and electric locomotives factories, aircraft manufacturing units will be set up in Bihar.
This will create employment opportunities for the youth in Bihar. This plan of the central government is indeed welcome for the people of Bihar. This will be a great leap forward in putting Bihar among the more advanced states of India. This airport will be a boon to the people of Darbhanga, as it will cut the travel time to various cities, both within and outside the state, drastically. What took hours can now be covered in minutes. Faraway places like Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore would seem so nearby.
There was also a discussion on the huge rush that the Patna airport experiences and what should be done to reduce it. Airports in the smaller towns of Bihar will mitigate the woes of passengers at the Patna airport. Also, the Darbhanga- Patna flight connectivity will reduce the travel time to minutes instead of hours at present.
A Huge Relief for the Travelers to Bihar
After all the airports are ready, Bihar would seem a smaller place to the traveller. It would become highly convenient for the people travelling to different places in Bihar, which seem so remote from Patna presently. Presently, everybody has to come to Patna to catch flights to various destinations outside the state.
