VIJAYAWADA: Tenders for the proposed international flight, Vijayawada-Dubai-Vijayawada, will be invited on Tuesday. The State government has decided to start this flight after receiving public feedback for another international flight. The tenders, which were earlier scheduled for February 11, have been postponed to February 26. The airline operator, who quotes the lowest Viability Gap Funding (VGF), will be awarded the bid on March 15.
According to official sources, the bids should be submitted to the Andhra Pradesh Airports Development Corporation Limited (APADCL) by 3 pm with a security deposit of `2 lakh. According to the officials, the flight from Vijayawada to Dubai will initially be a biweekly, adding this will be for a period of six months. The bids will be invited on March 15 and it will be awarded to those who placed their bid with lowest VGF.
At present, the Vijayawada Airport handles one international flight to Singapore. In January, the APADCL officials decided to find out from the public its opinion to have one more international flight from Vijayawada Airport.
The APADCL had directed the public responses on their website, www.apadcl.com. By January 23, the APADCL received as many as 2,42,594 responses on its website, while some sent their opinion through email, messages and WhatsApp.