KALABURAGI: The long-pending dream of residents of Kalayana Karnataka of having an airport at Kalaburagi was realised with Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa inaugurating the facility at 1.55 pm on Friday.
Yediyurappa, who boarded a Star Air flight in Bengaluru along with Deputy CM Govind Karjol (who is also Kalaburagi district in-charge minister), Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai, Animal Husbandry Minister Prabhu Chauhan, Kalaburagi MP Umesh Jadhav, Bidar MP Bhagwant Khuba and BJP national general secretary Muralidhar Rao reached Kalaburagi airport at 1.42 pm. Minister for Medium and Large Scale Industries Jagadish Shettar, who was already in Kalaburagi, also took part.
The 740-acre airport is located at Srinivas Saradagi village, about 15 km from Kalaburagi. The airport has a 3.25-km long runway.
Addressing the gathering, the CM said the inauguration of the airport heralded a new era of development in Kalyana Karnataka. “We have named this region as Kalyana Karnataka and it is my and my government’s duty to do Kalyana (develop) to this region of Karnataka. It is my promise to the people of Kalyana Karnataka that I will strive hard to develop this region and from next year sufficient budgetary allocation will be made to this region for development works,” he said.
Yediyurappa said that he was fortunate to have laid the foundation for the airport in 2008 when he was the CM and now, after 11 years, he was inaugurating it.
The CM and others returned to Bengaluru in the same flight at 3 pm. Star Air will operate flights to Bengaluru from Kalaburagi thrice a week (Mondays, Fridays and Sundays).