MADURAI: Parliamentarian S Venkatesan has urged the Airports Authority of India (AAI) to include the Madurai airport in the Bilateral Airport Services Agreement (BASA) and expedite the process to commence 24x7 operations at the airport. The demand was during the Madurai Airport Advisory Committee meeting convened by Chairman and Virudhunagar MP P Manickam Tagore and Venkatesan, who is also the co-chairman of the committee, on Tuesday.
AAI Director Muthukumar, Deputy Commissioner of Police Pratheep and Agrofood Chamber of Commerce and Industry President and Member of Madurai Airport Advisory Committee S Rethinavelu took part in the meeting. Addressing mediapersons after the meeting, Venkatesan said the 24x7 operation of the airport was suspended due to the unavailability of adequate number of CISF personnel.
"This is not acceptable. The authorities must take all steps to resume the round-the-clock operations at the earliest. The union government is not showing interest in operating the airport 24x7 though the footfall is very high in Madurai. The Varanasi airport which has comparatively much less footfall, is running round-the-clock," the Madurai MP said. He also announced that the Air India flight which flies to Singapore three days a week from Madurai, will operate daily from October 22 onwards.