___________

Following is an excerpt from a report in Pioneer.

Air Deccan is going to offer special packages to the tourists to visit Bhitarkanika mangrove forest, the second largest mangrove forest of India. Apart from that they would get a chance to pay a visit to the beaches of Gahirmatha marine sanctuary, the world’s largest rookery of endangered Olive Ridley sea turtles, the doorless village of Sialia under Rajkania, the magnificent Royal palace of Rajkanika, Hukitola island and nearby tourists spots, said managing director of Deccan Aviation Captain Gopinath on Saturday at Rajkanika.

Gopinath along with a senior official of Deccan Aviation PB Devaya, visited Bhitarkanika on a helicopter on Saturday. The helicopter landed on the ground of royal palace of Rajkanika. The scion of royal family of Rajkanika Shivendu Narayan Bhanjadeo accompanied the officials, who visited the water bodies and dense mangrove forests on a boat. Bhanjadeo said, "As the park is situated about 110 km from Bhubaneswar and the connecting road conditions from the capital city to Bhitarkanika are not so good for which tourists are not taking interest to visit the park."

"As no air communication facilities was available from Bhubaneswar to Bhitarkanika, a couple months ago, I urged the officials of Deccan Aviation to take initiatives to run flights to the national park to boost tourist inflow. After getting invitation, two senior officials visited Bhitarkanika to conduct a survey. Presently, the ground of the palace at Rajkanika will be used as a temporary airfield or helipad for the landing of helicopters and small planes", said Bhanjadeo.

Recently, the State Government formed a Bhitarkanika Eco-Tourism Society (BETS) to attract more tourists to Bhitarkanika, said Bhanjadeo, who is also a member of the society.

The forest officials have recently constructed a tower in Bhitarkanika for the tourists to watch the birds, spotted deer, wild boars, water monitors, crocodiles, snakes and other animals from the top.

The following is from http://rc.orissa.gov.in/index3.asp?linkid=30&sublinkid=411.

PRESS RELEASE

DT.20.03.2008

GOVERNMENT OF ORISSA PRESS RELEASE

New Delhi March 20, 2008

Shri Naveen Patnaik, Chief Minister, Orissa met Smt. Ambika Soni, Union Minister, Tourism & Culture today and discussed about various tourism projects of the State. The Chief Minister demanded for an early sanction of Rs.50 crore for development of tourism infrastructure and facilities in the famous tourism circuit of Bhubaneswar-Konark-Puri-Chilika under the Mega Circuit Scheme. The Union Minister agreed to include the circuit of Bhubaneswar-Konark-Puri-Chilika under the Mega Circuit Scheme and extend all necessary assistance under the scheme for its integrated development. She also agreed to consider release of 50% of the funds immediately.

The Chief Minister asked for a direct flight and a thematic tourist train to connect Varanasi and Bodhigaya with the Buddhist sites of Orissa. This would provide a great boost to employment and tourism in the State. The Union Minister intimated that the Government of India will extend all support for the connectivity of the Buddist sites. She also agreed to take up the matter with the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Ministry of Railways soon. She also intimated that the matter of rail connectivity of Bhubaneswar, Banaras and Gaya will be discussed with the Planning Commission and Ministry of Railways soon.

The Chief Minister urged the Union Minister to take up the project of sound and light show for Konark, which is a world heritage site and also for the historic Barabati Fort at Cuttack. The Union Minister was also requested for expeditious completion of the sound and light show at Khandagiri. The Chief Minister also demanded for better maintenance of the historical monuments, Buddhist sites, temples and other protected monuments by the Archeological Survey of India.

Following is from the PIB http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=36250.

The Minister for Civil Aviation, Shri Praful Patel informed the Parliament today the target date for completion of modernization process of the 35 non-metro airports by the Airports Authority of India (AAI), is March 2010.

New Terminal Buildings expandable on modular basis are being constructed at Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Aurangabad, Agatti, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Chandigarh, Dehradun, Goa, Jaipur, Lucknow, Indore, Khajuraho, Madurai, Mangalore, Port Blair, Ranchi, Raipur, Rajkot, Trivandrum, Trichy, Udaipur, Varanasi and Vishakhapatnam airports. Modification/expansion of existing Terminal Buildings is being undertaken at airports in Agra, Agartala, Coimbatore, Dimapur, Guwahati, Imphal, Jammu, Nagpur, Patna, Pune and Vadodara.

Airside works including expansion and strengthening of runway for wide bodied aircraft operations, extension/new construction of Apron for more parking of aircrafts, link taxiways and parallel taxi tracks are being taken up at these airports as per requirement. At 24 of these airports, cityside development through Public Private Partnership is being undertaken. Bids for pre-qualification have been received for Amritsar and Udaipur airports.

Following is an excerpt from a report in Pioneer.

The Government has approached the Indian Airports Authority of India for night landing facilities at the Biju Patnaik Airport here. The IAAI authorities have assured that a Terminal Approach Radar would soon be installed which could enable night landing facilities. The night landing facilities would help the local hospitality industries occupancy rates, Mishra said. A proposal has been mooted for three more airports other than Bhubaneswar and Jharsuguda for improving connectivity.

Following is an excerpt from a report in New Indian Express.

The public carrier has decided to reintroduce the Kolkata-Bangalore flight via Bhubaneswar and Chennai on February 18. A brand new Airbus 319 would be introduced on this lucrative sector.

… The new flight will boast of business class. It will operate on all the days of the week and would leave Bangalore at 9.30 in the morning and arrive here at 1 pm and in Kolkata at 2.35 pm. It will reach Chennai at 10.15 and take off at 11.05 am.

In the return direction, the flight will take off from Kolkata at 3.25 pm and arrive here at 4.20 pm. It will leave at 5 pm and arrive in Chennai at 6.55 pm and depart at 7.45 pm. The plane will touch down in Bangalore at 8.30 pm.

Update: New Indian Express reports that Air Deccan has plans to connect Bhubaneswar with Tirupati.

Kudos: I traveled several legs on Indigo (Bhubaneswar-Hydearabad-Bangalore, Bangalore-Kochi, Kochi-Goa, Goa-Hyderabad-Kolkata). All of its flights were in time and some reached destinations before time. Excellent service. Free food is not given but one can buy food on-board. Very happy with this airline and am  glad to see they will be connecting Bhubaneswar with Mumbai and Kolkata from Jan 29th. My best wishes to this airline.

mini-Kudos: Used the site http://www.ezeego1.co.in/ to book ticket two days before a flight. They were offering great deals.

Mega disaster: I had booked Bhubaneswar-Bangalore flight on Jetlite through a travel agent from Bhubaneswar, who I thought I knew well. When I called Jetlite the day before the travel (a) first they told me that my reservation was canceled because the travel agent did not do something in time. (b) later I found out that they had just canceled the Bhubaneswar -Bangalore flight altogether and neither the airlines nor the travel agent informed me about that.

So-so: I am familiar with three main travel sites for booking tickets in India.

• http://www.ezeego1.co.in/: Has great deals. Does not seem to accept international credit cards.
• http://makemytrip.co.in/makemytrip/MMTHome.do: Accepts international credit cards. Has software issues: When I booked a ticket with me as the booking person and my wife as the traveler it booked the ticket in my name and I ended up having two tickets on my name on the same flight. Great customer service over email and phone in correcting mistakes. It did not inform me about the cancellation of Kolkata-Bhubaneswar flight. But after I told them, they issued an immediate refund.
• http://www.cleartrip.com/: Does not seem to accept international credit cards.

Disappointment: Indian canceled Kolkata-Bhubaneswar flight that I was booked on  and I had to make alternative arrangements just 2-3 days before my travel date.

Dealing with a local Bhubaneswar travel agent with office in Jayadev Vihar: I thought since I knew this person well, he will give me better service. It was somewhat of a disappointment; but I am not sure how much I can blame the agent for this. Following are the good and bad parts.  (a)  Jetlite claims that  the main travel agent (Eastern travels) that this travel agent went through did not do some thing in time so they canceled my booking. The local travel agent (Orissa travels) responded that Jetlite often finds flimsy reasons to do such cancellation. I don’t know whom to believe. (b) His deals for a Kerala package was Rs 22000 (instead of the Rs 23,800 that I paid to the Bangalore agent)  but involved worse hotels. (c) Did not inform me about Jetlite flight being canceled; but did promptly inform me about the Indian flight that got canceled. (c) While makemytrip refunded me completely for the Indian flight that got canceled this travel agent says Indian only gave him a coupon to be used in 1 year. There is no way I can use this coupon.  (d) The tickets in Indigo that I bought from this agent were all fine. (e) Paying him for the tickets was convenient as his people came and picked up the money from my parents. They also refunded to my parents, albeit not so promptly.

Travel agents on the net: Came across two very good travel agents to arrange my Kerala trip and my Goa trip. (Did have to spend time in finding them. Also, may be I was lucky.) They both gave good deals and things went pretty well. I sent money to their ICICI account from mine; it was easy and quick. The two agents and the various companies involved in these trips were:

• http://www.malabarholidays.indiatourism.com: Mr. Shekar based in Bangalore 09448230450 / 09343835483 (Kerala Trip) is the agent I communicated with initially and Tours India International, Cochin, really took care of the reservations locally.
  • Avenue Regent Kochi: Wonderful hotel, will stay again here if I am in Kochi.
  • Backwater Resort, Kumarakom:  Decent resort in Kumarakom. Will stay here if in Kumarakom.
  • NAS group house boat: Not as great looking as the other house boats. (It may not have been a NAS group house boat, but a temporary rental.) Had a deck which many don’t have and view from the deck is even better. A/C control not in the room so the night spent was not as nice as it got cold and noisy and there was no way to turn it off. The overall experience was marvelous, but next time I will make sure about the particular boat I am in and solve the a/c issue beforehand.

• www.amchogoa.com and http://www.samsantravels.com: Summaiya.91-98694 25430 (Goa hotels)
  • Longuinhos Beach Resort Colva, Goa: Right on the beach. Nice people. Great restaurant. A/C in the room old style; one has to turn it off and on by hand.

Indian Railways: Was able to buy e-ticket on the net using International credit card. Could get 3 a/c Kolkata-Bhubaneswar  ticket in Coromondal 2 days before the trip. (A/C chair car tickets in Janashtabdi were not available. But as my wife told me, regular sleeper tickets are better than a/c chair car seats as one can sit as well as sleep on a sleeper ticket.)

Jet airways: Unlike the disastrous experience with its subsidiary Jetlite, the Bangkok-Kolkata-Bangkok flights in Jet airways were very good. The food was great, the entertainment available in the seat back sets were very good, the flights were on time and the tickets were the least expensive in that route. I hope they fix the problems with Jetlite asap; otherwise the negative impression that Jetlite will make will harm the overall brand name.

Lessons:

• Have an ICICI account. It is very useful in sending money to make reservations.
• Have access to rupee based credit card as many airlines in India do not accept international credit cards.
• Avoid small local travel agents for out-of-state travel. They have less clout, so they may not be able to do the best for you, even if they want to.
• Avoid Jetlite and Indian.
• Patronize Indigo.
• For Kolkata-Bhubaneswar leg, good old Indian Railways is the most reliable means.
• For hotel rooms make sure what kind of a/c it has. Does the a/c have an automatic temperature control or you have to manually turn it on and off.
• For visits to particular part of India look for travel agents in that part of India.  You may get lucky and come across good ones.
• For air travel within India check out the three sites http://www.ezeego1.co.in/, http://makemytrip.co.in/makemytrip/MMTHome.do and http://www.cleartrip.com/  and see who has the best deal.
• Airlines change their schedules frequently. Check often.

Its schedule is as follows:

The following is from http://203.94.240.226/iaschedule/iaschedule.xls.

The following is from http://www.flykingfisher.com/schedule.asp?tab=3.

KOLKATA TO

The following is from http://www.airdeccan.net/data/flightinfo/from_bhubaneshwar.html.

Bhubaneswar to

Bangalore to

Delhi to

Hyderabad to

Kolkata to

Mumbai to

From Nov 17th Indigo starts flights connecting BBSR to Delhi, Bangalore and Hyderabad. We wrote about this in http://www.orissalinks.com/orissagrowth/?p=818. Current reports mention plans beyond that. Following is an excerpt from a report on this in Tathya.in.

The airline is going to introduce new connectivity from Bhubaneswar to Mumbai & Kolkata in December and to Chennai in January 2008.

The current schedule is at http://book.goindigo.in/skylights/cgi-bin/skylights.cgi?module=c3&page=DESTINATIONSNEW.

The current schedule is:

6E 252 Bhubaneshwar Delhi 7:10 PM 9:20 PM Daily
6E 251 Delhi Bhubaneshwar 8:55 AM 11:00 AM Daily

6E 251 Bhubaneshwar Hyderabad 11:35 AM 12:55 PM Daily
6E 252 Hyderabad Bhubaneshwar 5:20 PM 6:40 PM Daily

6E 251 Bhubaneshwar Bangalore 11:35 AM 2:45 PM Daily Hyderabad
6E 252 Bangalore Bhubaneshwar 3:30 PM 6:40 PM Daily Hyderabad

Following is an excerpt from a report in Pioneer.

The modernisation works of the Biju Patnaik Airport at Bhubaneswar will soon be completed. A new terminal will be set up to accommodate the rising air traffic. At one time, eight A-320 Airbuses can be parked in the airstrips. The terminal building is in the planning stage and will be given a formal shape soon, sources said. Rs 20 crore has been invested to give a new look to the airport.

Meanwhile, the runway of the Airport has been increased from 7,500 feet to 9,000 feet. The parking system of the airport will be increased two times of the existing capacity. It may be noted that the inflow of air passengers have been increased a number of times.

I don’t know starting from when. But just stumbled across the following. (For my Bangalore readers, I plan to be in Bangalore on Dec 31st and Jan 1 and would love to meet you guys.)

Indigo airlines will connect Bhubaneswar with non-stop to Delhi and Hydearabad and one stop (via Hyderabad) to Bangalore from November 17th. The new schedule is at http://book.goindigo.in/skylights/cgi-bin/skylights.cgi?module=c3&page=DESTINATIONSNEW.

The schedule is:

6E 252 Bhubaneshwar Delhi 7:10 PM 9:20 PM Daily
6E 251 Delhi Bhubaneshwar 8:55 AM 11:00 AM Daily

6E 251 Bhubaneshwar Hyderabad 11:35 AM 12:55 PM Daily
6E 252 Hyderabad Bhubaneshwar 5:20 PM 6:40 PM Daily

6E 251 Bhubaneshwar Bangalore 11:35 AM 2:45 PM Daily Hyderabad
6E 252 Bangalore Bhubaneshwar 3:30 PM 6:40 PM Daily Hyderabad

The following is an ad from Samaja.

Following is an excerpt from a report in New Indian Express.

Effecting a major change in its schedule for Bhubaneswar, Air India has reduced the flights CD-7541 and CD-7542 on the Bangalore-Chennai- Bhubaneswar- Kolkata route to four days a week. In fact, it has obliterated Bangalore from the route.

The flights would, from October 11, ply only on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. The flight CD-7541 would now depart Chennai at 10.05 am to land in Bhubaneswar at 12 noon. It would take off for Kolkata at 12.30 pm and land there at 1.25 pm.

Flight CD-7542 would take off from Kolkata at 2.30 pm to arrive Bhubaneswar at 3.25 pm. It would proceed to Chennai at 3.55 pm and land there at 5.50 pm. The daily flight IC 7479 connecting Delhi, Ranchi to Bhubaneswar has also been downgraded to five times a week.

The flight from Thursday would ply only on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday. It would take off from Delhi at 4.55 pm to touch down at Ranchi at 6.40 pm from where it would leave at 7.10 pm and arrive in Bhubaneswar at 8.00 pm.

Following is an excerpt from a New Indian Express report on this.

A three member survey team of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) on Friday made a spot assessment of the Rourkela airstrip to find out the feasibility of re-introduction of air connectivity to the city.

Led by senior civil aviation consultant and former executive director of AAI D P Chakravorty the team comprised Air Traffic Controller (East) Timir Bandhopadhyay and AAI’s Chief of Communication R K Chandra.

They have reportedly expressed satisfaction over the existing infrastructure.

The team found the airstrip infrastructre here better than that at Ranchi and Jamshedpur. The team, however, felt the need for a passenger terminal besides further strengthening of the existing fire services.

Following are excerpts from a New Indian Express report by Samiran Sarangi. I talked to him on phone. He says that if everything goes well the expectation is that the flight from BBSR would start around mid-November or early December.

Is Orissa set to have its first international flight – and that too to Singapore? Air India has reportedly agreed to oblige, provided travel and tour operators here ensure a good number of passengers. Travel agents, on their part, are confident of making it possible. More so because the flight that Air India wants to operate via the city is its low cost carrier Air India Express. It would operate on the Kolkata-Singapore route from October 7. A round trip would cost a traveller just about Rs 14,500, as against the normal fare of Rs 24,000. A team from Air India, which visited the city sometime back to study the market here, has asked for at least 40 to 50 passengers on each flight. The 185-seater Boeing 737-800 would be operating thrice a week. "We firmly believe that with the present flow of travellers from the State to Singapore, we can achieve the target," said a confident Benjamin Simon, head of the city-based tour firm Travellink. According to him, roughly 30 to 40 persons head for the island country from Orissa every week as business and leisure travellers. A considerable number of them are from the Western belt of Sambalpur, Jharsuguda and Rourkela. … A section of the operators are designing packages that would also include board and lodging at the existing fare at Rs 24,000. It would basically be a three-night-two-day affair and include sightseeing.