Bhubaneswar:The Odisha government is negotiating with the Airport Authority of India (AAI) and the airlines company SpiceJet to introduce sea plane to cover tourists destinations of the state.
Following the offer from the SpiceJet to operate sea plane on three routes in Odisha, the state government has asked the tourism department to workout the proposal.
The airlines company has proposed to fly sea planes from Bhubaneswar to Chandipur via Bhitarkanika National Park and back , Bhubaneswar to Puri via Chilika Lake and back and Bhubaneswar to Hirakud Dam and back.
“We are open to revision, discussion and feasibility of routes based on local requirement, profitability and tourism potential in the region,” said Shantanu Kalita, advisor to SpiceJet chairman. “We are already charting out a Detailed Project Report (DPR) on our own to assess the feasibilities, infrastructure-development, capacity-building and policy-level implementation to explore the potential of introducing sea plane operations in India, with special focus given to the state of Odisha,” he added.
A pre-feasibility study for water aerodrome operations in Chilika Lake has been conducted by a multi-disciplinary team headed by AAI general manager Sangeeta Mahay on June 14.
