Chandigarh, March 21, 2025 (Yes Punjab News)
Chandigarh MP and Former Union Minister Manish Tewari today urged the Chief Ministers of Punjab and Haryana, besides the UT administrator to take up with the Ministry of Civil Aviation the issue of designating the Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh Chandigarh International Airport at Chandigarh as a Points of Call (POC).
He disclosed that he had discussed the matter with the union Civil Aviation Minister Kinjarapu Rammohan Naidu and also raised the matter within the Lok Sabha.
Tewari said, while the union minister during his meeting had assured him that the ministry will take a policy call on it, given that similar requests had come in from various state capitals across the country but in an answer to his question in the Lok Sabha the ministry straightway declined to designate Chandigarh airport as POC on the pretext that they want to incentivise India registered carriers to fly to international destinations from Non – Metro Airports.
The senior Congress leader pointed out, since Chandigarh is functioning as the joint capital of Punjab and Haryana, the Chief Ministers of two states, besides the Chandigarh Administrator/Punjab Governor must also take up the matter with the centre for designating Chandigarh Airport as the POC.
The Chandigarh MP said the union minister had assured him that he had received similar representations from other State Capitals and would be taking a view with regard to designating Chandigarh Airport other such airports as Points of Call (POC).
“Unfortunately I was quite taken aback in response to an Unstarred Question asked by me on the 20th of March, 2025 which was answered by your Minister of State, Shri Murlidhar Mohol.
The answer categorically states that Chandigarh Airport will not be granted a Point of Call (POC) status”, Tewari said in a letter to the union minister of Civil Aviation.
The former union minister observed, “this actually is contrary to the earlier assertions made in the same answer, which say that the criteria for designating an Airport as a Point of Call (POC) is if there is a large diaspora that travels frequently from that particular airport to various other parts of the world”.
He pointed out that, in the case of the Chandigarh International Airport, a large number of people from Punjab regularly travel to Canada, United States of America, United Kingdom, a large part of Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and UAE for both work and tourism.
Therefore, he argued, Chandigarh International Airport squarely fits into the criteria for being designated as a Points of Call (POC).
Quoting the ministry’s answer to his question, he said, “there are 31 POCs already designated which include places like Ghorakpur and Nagpur even Bagdogra, where I do not think there is substantive international traffic or there is a very large diaspora from these areas which is resident in any place around the world in a concentrated manner”.
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