Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma is keen to get flights between Shillong and Dhaka going to drive tourism forward in Meghalaya.
The state government has begun discussions with the Centre on this. These are still at the nascent stage but Meghalaya feels that Dhaka can be a big source of tourists because Shillong would be the closest hill station for the Bangladesh capital.
“Provided that we get the entire infrastructure and the required systems in place, we are hopeful that these kinds of things will happen,” Sangma said, adding that there are specific challenges to connect to international destinations. He also said that more should be done to link the North East to neighbouring countries by flight, as the region is within around 90 minutes away from the capital cities of half a dozen countries.
The CM noted that Umroi Airport, which serves Shillong, is now buzzing with six to seven flights per day, mostly connecting to other North East cities, which is bringing in extra tourists to Meghalaya.
“Yes, air connectivity remains a big challenge. We have a large challenge in terms of the larger aircraft landing out there because of the different instrument landing systems and protocols that are in place, which have a lot of restrictions,” Sangma said. “We will not give up on this and our efforts will be on continuously to ensure that there is more and more connectivity, especially from the metros like directly from Hyderabad, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi. These are important locations and we also strongly feel that there is a huge tourism potential, even at the high-end bracket, from Bangladesh.”
