Air Odisha gets show cause notice for stopping services in Jharsuguda airport

The civil aviation ministry has issued a notice to Air Odisha, which has stopped services to the Jharsuguda airport within days of inauguration under the government’s Udan scheme.

The airline, owned by relatives of industrialist Gautam Adani, was allotted 50 routes under the Ude Desh Ka Aam Nagrik scheme, known as Udan that aims to connect unserved and under-served airports in the country. However, Air Odisha has been unable to operate flights on majority of routes and has flown around 2500 passengers in Udan flights with loads less than 40 per cent. But, poor planning, technical issues with aircraft, shortages of pilots and engineers, and nonavailability of slots have grounded Air Odisha flights for more than 15 days, leading to the ministry notice and protests from the opposition Congress.

“The Jharsuguda airport is a fullfledged functional airport and available for all domestic scheduled and non-scheduled operations. The selected airline under Udan has been issued with a show cause notice for discontinuing their operations quoting technical reasons,” the ministry tweeted. Non-commencement of operations within the given time would lead to cancellation of the current award. Routes would be opened for bidding and allocated to eligible airlines for better connectivity, the ministry said.

Local legislator Naba Kishore Das has threatened an agitation if the flights from Jharsuguda are not resumed in a month. Das will also meet Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to press for his demands.

Air Odisha officials could not be reached for comments.

The Jharsuguda airport, second in the state, was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on September 22. Air Odisha had bagged the rights to operate flights from Jharsuguda to Bhubaneswar, Ranchi, and Raipur under Udan.