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| Kashmir true paradise on earth and Jammu……? | | Srinagar airport boasts of international standard, the one in Jammu is becoming bus stand | |
NIRBHAY JAMMUAL
Jammu, July 8: “Kashmir is the Paradise on Earth” –the nature has bestowed the Valley with best of scenic beauty while the political leadership of state has done all to convert it into a paradise if it were not –though at the cost of other regions.
The International Airport coming up in Budgam district –just a stone’s throw away from the Srinagar City Center –is a case in point. The successive regimes played it very hard with the Central Government and particularly the Union Ministry of Civil Aviation to get the international status for Srinagar airport. The state of the art building that is coming up there can best be described as owner’s pride and neighbour’s envy.
Very soon direct flights from various global destinations will be taking off from Srinagar. The idea of elevating the Srinagar airport to International standard and relegating the Jammu airport to the downmarket pathetic airstrip was that more tourists –domestic and international visit Kashmir Valley as compared to Jammu.
It is true that more tourists visit Kashmir but this happens only for around four months a year. On the contrary the tourist influx to Jammu is a quite steady and on an average around 20,000 pilgrim tourists come in to pay obeisance at the Mata Vaishno Devi shrine alone. There are many who head elsewhere and still there are many such tourists who actually intend to visit Kashmir but instead take circuitous route via Jammu. Thus in all certainty the number of tourists visiting Jammu are far higher than those visiting Kashmir.
Therefore, a fair-play of wisdom would have suggested planning an international standard airport at Jammu instead of Srinagar. No wonder that planes coming in and going out of Jammu and Srinagar to Delhi always take a circuitous route of touching both the airports during any single trip.
It is quite unfortunate that Jammu had a quite good representation in Civil Aviation ministry but still no significant funds could be mobilised or plans drawn out for upgradation of Jammu airport. In the early 1990s the present Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad remained Union Cabinet Minister for Civil Aviation and Tourism. While Prof Chaman Lal Gupta, the tradition champion of the cause of Jammu, was very recently Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation.
During Gupta’s period much hue and noise was made about the airport but except a modest expansion and a dome shaping of the building nothing substantial was done to make this airport worth some standards.
Now days more flights are landing at Jammu airport than ten years back and many more airliners are planning to touch the ground. With the air fares nose diving even the conventional train and taxi travellers are also taking the flights thus making huge rush at the Jammu airport.
While authorities are finding it difficult to manage the rush of passengers and offer facility to the flight boarders the tourists go home with a poor impression of the region. With pathetic state of affairs the Jammu airport is now fast taking a look of the local bus stand.
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