Bids invited for air links to 3 unserved Andamans airports

To boost tourism in the Andaman & Nicobar Islands, the Centre has invited bids to provide flight services to three unserved airports in the region under the fourth round of the regional air connectivity -- Udan -- scheme.

"With focus on connectivity of islands, Udan 4.0 scheme under the MoCA (Ministry of Civil Aviation) has invited bids for three unserved airports in the Andaman & Nicobar Island and one underserved airport in the Lakshadweep Island," it said on Monday.

"The MoCA has also recognised four water aerodrome locations in the Andamans and two in the Lakshadweep Island that is up for bidding," it said.

According to the statement, the Home Ministry is aiming to promote the Cochin-Agatti-Cochin sector and allow more airlines to operate this route.

"Accordingly, as an exception to the scheme, the Cochin-Agatti route has been incorporated under the current version of the scheme to provide additional connectivity to the island region," it said.

Under the Udan 4 scheme, the Ministry is also providing additional viability gap funding (VGF) of around 25 per cent to airlines.

"The MoCA aims to operationalise 1,000 routes and more than 100 airports in five years. This would be achieved by focusing on operationalising routes in priority areas," the Ministry said.

"The AAI would focus on developing no-frills airports and routes connecting such airports would be prioritised for the award of VGF. The market would be incentivised to develop short-haul routes only, providing connectivity to nearby airports," it said Last week, the Centre had invited bids for the fourth round of the RCS-Udan scheme with focus on priority areas, like the northeastern and hill states, the Union Territories of Ladakh and J&K.