78 new airline routes announced in India under the UDAN scheme

New Delhi: The Union Government has approved 78 new airline routes under the UDAN (‘Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik,’ the common citizens of India will fly) scheme. The new routes include north-eastern states, hilly regions and islands. While the airline services, closed during the lockdown, are slowly returning to normal, this comes as a major relief for the people of the country. The Union Government had started the UDAN scheme in 2016.

The UDAN scheme was introduced to establish air connectivity between small and medium towns. Fare for 50% of the seats on each flight is prescribed by the government, depending on the maximum distance. Under the UDAN scheme, all the airports and helipads in the country will be connected. 2.65 million seats will be made available under the project, and the fare will be charged based on ₹2,500 per hour and with consideration for the distance in kilometres.

In the first three stages of UDAN, operations were started on 274 routes out of 688. On Thursday, 78 pathways were approved in the fourth stage of UDAN. There are 29 served, eight unserved and two underserved airports in these routes. Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri expressed confidence by saying that, ‘Under the UDAN scheme, 56 routes were sanctioned in the first stage, 118 in the second and 100 routes were sanctioned in the third stage. In the 78 new routes, 18 airports from small towns will be connected to the metropolis of Delhi, Kolkata and Ranchi. The new routes will provide an impetus to tourism and strengthen the economy.’

The new routes started are majorly for better connectivity with the border and hilly regions. These will mainly benefit north-eastern India, hilly areas and people living on the islands. They will have flight connectivity due to this initiative.

The fourth stage of UDAN includes Guwahati, Tezu, Rupai, Tezpur, Pasighat, Misa and Shillong. Whereas, Delhi-Bareilly, Bilaspur-Bhopal, Kanpur-Moradabad, Aligarh-Chitrakoot, Chitrakoot-Prayagraj, Shawasti-Kanpur routes have also been started. The flights from Chandigarh to Hisar, Dehradun and Dharamshala also have been approved. Some parts of Lakshadweep islands also will be connected under this scheme. Since it was started in 2016, flights have been started on 766 new air routes, till date.