IAF shoots down airport ‘brainwave’

Kolkata: Air Force officers today shot down a state Congress proposal to Union civil aviation minister Mr Praful Patel to use a part of Kalaikunda airbase as a domestic airport.
Congress Legislature Party leader Dr Manas Bhuniya told The Statesman: “A PCC delegation met Mr Patel in Delhi and apprised him of our idea that was conceived in the wake of chemical hub and SEZ plans in Haldia and industrial growth in other parts of East and West Midnapore.’’
Air Force station Kalaikunda, a premier air ase in the country, has been recently renovated and modernised. It has an air-to-ground range at Dudhkundi near the airfield and an air-to-sea range in the Bay of Bengal.
An IAF officer said: “ With the increase in militant activities, a civil terminal will not suit IAF’s interest as this will be a perpetual threat to IAF’s tactics and strategies which get formulated here. If open to civil flights, the training pattern would also get adversely affected.”
Asked as to why then a part of Bagdogra air station has been already opened to civil flights, he said it was done to cater to the needs of passengers from Siliguri, Darjeeling and Sikkim. But Bagdogra airfield is no match to Kalaikunda airbase.
11/05/07 Soma Mookherjee/The Statesman

To Read the News in full at Source, Click the Headline

Categories: Airports May 2007, New May 2007