The Minister of Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya M. Scindia and Minister of State for Civil Aviation (Gen)Dr V.K Singh (Retd) virtually inaugurated the direct flight between Delhi and Deoghar by Indigo.
The event was graced by Hafizul Hasan, Minister for Tourism, Government of Jharkhand, Nishikant Dubey, Member of Parliament (Lok Sabha) Godda, Jharkhand, Narayan Das, Member of Legislative Assembly, Deoghar, Sunil Soren, Member of Legislative Assembly, Dumka, Rajeev Bansal, Secretary, Ministry of Civil Aviation, and many other dignitaries from MoCA, Government of Jharkhand and Indigo were virtually present.
The airline will be deploying its A320 Neo, a 180-seater twin turbofan engine passenger aircraft and is primarily used on Domestic routes. With this new flight launch, total number of departures from Deoghar will be 11 daily departure flights.
Speaking on the occasion, Scindia said, “Baba Baidya Nath Dham in Deoghar is an international religious heritage, and it gives me immense pleasure to state that my ministry has helped millions of pilgrims to visit Deoghar. Along with country’s hard economic power, we need to dovetail country’s soft power too. That’s the reason why major aviation infrastructure is created at places such as Ayodhya International Airport, Kushinagar International Airport and now Deoghar Airport. I would also like to congratulate Indigo for connecting smaller cities in the country and the day is not far when Civil Aviation will become the primary source of traveling in India. On 12th July, Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi announced that Deoghar will connected with Delhi and today it is coming true. Flight is being captained by Rajiv Pratap Rudy.”
The minister further said “We constructed Deoghar Airport which is spread at 655 acres and constructed at a cost of INR 400 crore, making it the second airport in Jharkhand after Ranchi. We are also working on 3 more airports in Jharkhand – Bokaro, Jamshedpur and Dumka taking the total number of airports in Jharkhand to 5. We have announced 14 new routes connecting Jharkhand out of which 2 routes – Deoghar – Kolkata and Delhi – Deoghar have been started and in the coming days, we will connect Deoghar with Ranchi and Patna. Along with this, we will connect Dumka with Ranchi and Kolkata. Bokaro airport once completed will be connected with Patna and Kolkata.”
The minister further added “425 routes and 68 airports, heliports, water drome have been operationalized under the UDAN scheme and more than 1 crore people, mostly first-time flyers, have benefitted from it. Over 1 lakh 90 thousand flights have flown under this scheme. Ministry of Civil Aviation has constructed 66 airports in the last 8 years which stood at 74 airports in the year 2014. We are planning to construct 220 new airports which includes Water Dromes and Heliports in the next 5 years.”
Singh said “Construction of an airport in Deoghar was a long demand which was inaugurated on 12th July this year by our Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi. Deoghar was connected to Kolkata only but now it will connect with Delhi directly. This will help facilitate seamless movement of pilgrims coming to Baba Baidya Nath Dham which will increase tourism in Jharkhand, and I hope that other airlines will adopt the same route for more flight to Deoghar.”
