Thursday, April 11, 2013

Odisha begins land scouting for Jeypore airport

Business Standard, April 10, 2013
he direction from the dept comes after AAI recently submitted pre-feasibility report on Jeypore airstrip spread over 60 acres
The state general administration (GA) department has asked the Koraput district collector to identify 310 acres of land for development of an airport at Jeypore.

The direction from the department comes after the Airport Authority of India (AAI) recently submitted the pre-feasibility report on Jeypore airstrip spread over 60 acres of land.

"One of the preliminary requirements of the report is 310 acres of a single patch land with good road connection and without any natural barrier", Premananda Khuntia, joint secretary, GA department wrote to the collector.

It may be noted that a technical team of AAI had visited Jeypore in January this year for pre-feasibility study for developing the air strip into an airport.

"The exercise for identification of 310 acres has already started. We will be submitting the report to the district collector soon", said an official of Koraput district administration.

Recently, at the inaugural ceremony of the new domestic terminal at Biju Patnaik airport, Civil aviation minister Ajit Singh had committed to develop the Jharsuguda airstrip into an airport after the allocation of land.

It may be noted, for providing connectivity to tier-II and tier-III cities and far flung areas, the civil aviation ministry is planning for 15 more airports under the Union government's greenfield airport policy.

Singh has also urged the state government to prepare a roadmap for the development civil aviation infrastructure in the state.

Odisha has 12 functional airstrips and 16 helipads. The state government is also working on a dedicated policy for development of civil aviation.

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