Tripura : Agartala-Chittagong Flight Services To Begin Shortly; Says ICA Minister

Tripura : Agartala-Chittagong Flight Services To Begin Shortly; Says ICA Minister – Sushanta Chowdhury

23rd August 2022

Abhijit Nath, NET Correspondent, Tripura

Agartala, August 23, 2022 : Tripura’s council of ministers under the chairmanship of Chief Minister Prof Dr Manik Saha on Tuesday approved to start flight services between Agartala and Chittagong in Bangladesh very shortly.

This decision has been taken after consultation with the union Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) under the UDAN scheme of the government of India, said Tripura’s cabinet spokesperson and Information & Cultural Affairs minister Sushanta Chowdhury in a press conference at Civil Secretariat here in Agartala city on Tuesday afternoon.

He said “For three days in every week, flights between Agartala and Chittagong will fly from Maharaja Bir Bikram Airport. The flight fare would be Rs 4,500 per person. Most probably, Spicejet airlines will provide the services of air connectivity.”

“As the flow of passengers is estimated to be around 50 percent in the beginning of this flight service between two countries, the government of Tripura will bear an estimated expenditure of Rs 15 crore as viable funding gap. This expenditure would be borne by the state government for a year”, he added.

Chowdhury said “As the matter of flight services is a bilateral issue, the government of India will take up the matter with the government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh soon, and we are hopeful that the flight services would start very soon.”

Replying to a query, cabinet spokesperson and ICA minister said “Based on a survey being done at various check posts connecting Tripura to Bangladesh, it has been found that the people are mostly from Chittagong side coming to this landlocked state of the north eastern region of India to avail medical benefits especially. According to this report, the Tripura government intended to start Agartala-Chittagong flight services at the earliest. In near future, Agartala-Dhaka flight services may also start depending on the necessity.”

Earlier in February this year, the central government announced 13 new routes for flights have been proposed across the country while 10 routes are in three North Eastern states- Assam, Manipur and Tripura. The proposed five routes for Assam state are- Guwahati-Bangkok-Guwahati, Guwahati-Dhaka-Guwahati, Guwahati-Kathmandu-Guwahati, Guwahati-Yangon-Guwahati and Guwahati-Hanoi-Guwahati. Proposed three routes for Manipur state are- Imphal-Mandalay-Imphal, Imphal-Bangkok-Imphal and Imphal-Kunming-Imphal. Two routes for Tripura state are- Agartala-Dhaka-Agartala and Agartala-Chittagong-Agartala.