The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has given permission to Bhubaneswar’s Biju Patnaik International Airport (BPIA) to operate round the clock from September 1. Currently, the airport is functional from 6:30am to 10:30pm.
BPIA director, R Mahalingam says, “IndiGo has decided to start more direct flights to Kolkata and Delhi (from Bhubaneswar). The first two additional flights from Bhubaneswar to Kolkata and Delhi will be in the evening. These flights will start from September 12.”
BPIA says, “The official notice hasn’t been issued to us yet, but it is confirmed that we will get permission to operate for 24-hours from September. However, we will only start operating at nights (10:30pm to 6:30am) from October.”
Mahalingam adds, “The other two additional flights to Delhi and Kolkata will be in the early morning and start from October 1.”
Flight 6E-793 will take off from Bhuabaneswar for Kolkata at 0555 and land at 0700.
Flight 6E-771 will take off from Bhubaneswar for Delhi at 0605 and land at 0810.
Air India, GoAir and Vistara operate domestic flights from the airport too. While BPIA doesn’t have direct international flights flying out of there, it has immigration and customs counters to carry out the necessary paperwork for Air India passengers who have connecting international flights from New Delhi.
Bhubaneswar is the capital of Odisha in East India. It is the first city to open for India’s Smart City Mission project.