Come summer, and people of Jammu and Kashmir will fly new heights. International flights to and from Srinagar airport will start operation from June by the time the new terminal building will be ready. To start with, flights to and from the Gulf countries will start operation. The decision was taken at a meeting in New Delhi late Tuesday night between Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad and Union Minister for Civil Aviation Praful Patel. The chairman, Airports Authority of India (AAI), Dr K Ramalingam and senior officers of the Civil Aviation Ministry and AAI were also present. The AAI chairman assured Azad and Patel that the new international airport terminal in Srinagar will be ready by June 2008. The building will handle 500 domestic and 450 international passengers per hour. The airport will have four aero bridges and five more aircraft parking bays have also been proposed. In the meeting it was also decided that the runway of the Jammu airport will be extended up to 9,000 ft from the existing 6,700 ft and a new terminal building will be constructed at a cost of more than Rs 100 crore. The AAI said another airport will be constructed at Kishtwar and a small airport will come up at Surankote in Poonch. The Ministry of Civil Aviation has cleared the project.The Ministry also agreed to Azad’s proposal for constructing a new terminal building at Leh airport. The new building will be constructed at a cost more than Rs 100 crore with extension in the built up area from the existing 2,500 sq meters to 12,000 sq meters. The new terminal will handle 500 passengers against 200 at present. The terminal will have two aero bridges.
