BANGALORE: It has been more than an year since the state cabinet recommended the Centre to rename Bengaluru International Airport (BIA) as Kempegowda International Airport, but that possibility seems far from reality. Sources say that none from the state government, including MPs, MLAs, ministers or Union Ministers from Karnataka, have so far pressurised the Union Government to rename the Bangalore International Airport after Kempegowda.
A few months ago, Bangalore South MP Ananth Kumar charged the Union Government with dilly-dallying on naming the Bengaluru International Airport after Kempegowda and had said that a delegation of senior BJP leaders from the state would meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and urge him to name the airport after Kempegowda. However, nothing has been done so far.
Home and District-in-charge Minister R Ashok said soon a delegation will go to Delhi in this regard. MLA and former Congress working president D K Shivakumar had raised the issue in the Assembly when B S Yeddyurappa was the then chief minister. According to Shivakumar, it is the duty of the state government to send a delegation to the Centre.
“None of the CMs from Karnataka have met the PM so far,” he said. When asked about some activists being against the proposal to rename BIA, he said, “It is our duty to honour Kempegowda. Moreover, when the airport in Mumbai is named after Chatrapathi Shivaji, Delhi’s airport after Indira Gandhi and Chennai’s airport after C N Annadurai, why shouldn’t we name Bangalore International Airport after Kempegowda?”