Dead Bhopal tarmac springs to life

BHOPAL: Sixty days ago, Raja Bhoj airport in the state capital was like a deserted airstrip in a far-flung city of India with just two airlines taking off to two destinations. Now, there's a dramatic change with the airport which was hugging the bottom of the air-connectivity league suddenly taking off to three new cities in three different states and two more flights in the offing.
Sources told TOI that Indigo is also likely to start operations from Bhopal airport. Currently, only Air India and Jet Airways are operating flights from Bhopal airport.
After losing connectivity to important centres like Ahmedabad and Hyderabad, airport authorities drew flak for failing to attract airlines despite big talk during the Global Investors Summit last year. The situation was such that the state capital's airport was unable to retain domestic airlines, forget about an international tag. In last one year, Bhopal had limited connectivity to Delhi and Mumbai only.
Private airlines SpiceJet that kicked off operations from Bhopal to Hyderabad and Delhi in the past, withdrew services last year while Jet scrapped operations to Hyderabad, Chennai and Kolkata. On an average, around 600 travellers fly from Bhopal daily.
However, the situation improved last three months with connectivity rising to three more cities. These cities were Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Hyderabad. Raipur flight is one way as it only comes from there.
Speaking to TOI, Bhopal airport director, K Gunasekaran said Bhopal is gaining traction on the national air map. "It is good to see airlines have raised flights to other destinations. Our job is to provide better services to flyers," he said.
Frequent flyers feel the need to connect Bhopal to other parts of the country.
Sources said airlines are also planning to connect Bhopal with Bengaluru, Chennai and Pune. "Bengaluru is almost final and airlines will declare the schedule by September," an official said.

Successive Madhya Pradesh governments have been making tall claims about air connectivity with major cities of the state for more than two decades. While airlines are still cagey, though some have shown interest, air taxi services had quit the air space following low passenger load and poor infrastructure. Though a Mumbai-based firm has signed a MoU for launching air taxi services, the situation on the ground is still slippery for take-off. The government may think of a big tourism boost by connecting cities with Cessna planes, but the airstrips do not have basic infrastructure like navigation lights for touchdown or a concrete tarmac. Will the government wake up before it plans a big take-off?