Abhijith N Kolpe
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangaluru
Mangaluru, Sep 15: Mangaluru is the main city of coastal Karnataka and a major commerical centre of the state, connected by land, sea, air and rail routes. The Mangaluru International Airport here has been growing in terms of facilities and passenger footfall, however, recent developments such as closure of Jet Airways and the opening of Kannur airport in Kerala have had heavy adverse impact on flight services at the city's airport.
Now, even as coronavirus pandemic continues to affect the travel industry, a Twitter campaign has been launched to boost the overall development of Mangaluru International Airport. The campaign is being held on Tuesday September 15 at 6 am to 6 pm with the hashtags #FlyFromIXE (IXE being Mangaluru airport's code), tagging to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the civil aviation ministry and the minister Hardeep Singh Puri, and Airport Authority of India.
The campaign has been launched by a group of young aviation enthusiasts from Mangaluru, and also includes young people from Bantwal, Puttur and other areas.
There is a dedicated 'Mangalore International Airport Users' page on Twitter which is carrying on the campaign to popularise the airport, along with making requests and suggestions for introduction of new services at the airport.
"Mangalore which is an important,major and fast growing city in Karnataka has Karnataka's second international and largest airport. IXE is the first airport in Karnataka to have 2 runways. When @jetairways Was serving IXE there were flights to Del and different cities (sic)," the page tweeted.
"But now, there less than 20 flights per day, when it was around 70 per day," it added.
A member of page, who did not wish to be named, told daijiworld, "Mangaluru is known as an educational hub and students come from various parts of the country to study here. It will help these students if there are more flight services. Mangaluru airport deserves companies like Air Asia, Kuwait Airways, Vistara and others. There is a demand to start flight services from Mangaluru to various cities such as New Delhi, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Guwahati, Pune, Belagavi, Jammu, Vishakapatnam, Thiruvanthapuram, Agatti, Port Blair, Mysuru, Singapore, Bangkok and to provide all facilities to Mangaluru airport under UDAAN yojana."
"Even the tax on aviation turbine fuel imposed by Karnataka government is more than that by Kerala government, which will effect the airline services in Mangaluru, and many airlines step back for this reason. Hence Kannur airport is preffered more than Mangaluru airport. The government is giving more importance to Kannur airport and neglecting Mangaluru airport," he said.
The organizers have asked the people to send tweets with the above mentioned hashtags seeking to bring Mangaluru airport under the Udaan scheme.