Mangalore Airport: A Dream Never Come True?
by Walter Nandalike
Editor-in-chief
Dubai, Aug 23: Reading the above headline you may feel a little disappointed, but that is not the intention of this write-up. The dream would have come true long back if leaders of Dakshina Kannada had worked honestly towards the benefit of the NRIs. Sadly, it did not happen.
As widely expected, H D Kumaraswamy, the honorable Chief minister of Karnataka, while on a private picnic to Dubai about three months ago, had said, even before being posed the question, that "within 30 days I will see that Mangalore will have direct flight from Dubai!" Some thirty days!
Mangaloreans did not see the direct flight, but within a month Kumaraswamy saw ‘Ganikappa!’ (the mining bribery scandal).
The hopes were already bleak because daijiworld readers were fed up with such promises having come earlier right from former PM Deve Gowda, former CM Bangarappa, former CM Veerappa Moily, former deputy CM Siddaramaiah...and many others.
Aviation specialist and NRI Karnataka Forum coordinator Rajesh Sequeira, with no political support and no godfather has burnt a hole in his own pocket by spending quite a large amount on this mission (No sponsors!), and an enormous amount of resources, time and energy.
An important breakthrough was declaration of Mangalore Airport as a Customs Airport. Indeed this was a big victory on the way for the fight for an International status for the Bajpe airport.
Rajesh, who does not want to break the silence for a few days, has strongly hinted that a remarkable breakthrough has been achieved and it will be disclosed just at the right time so that no one will foil the plan, and even if it does not materialize due to some reason, no one will blame him for giving 'false hopes'. He has learnt to be diplomatic these days.
Now hopes have been kindled in the hearts of Mangaloreans in Dubai with the thought that Air India has given a slot to Mangalore airport during the winter season. Air India does not want to confirm this news officially now, because they have been embarrassed with the earlier announcement of dates which were unfortunately not realized. On the other hand they do not want to deny either that they are ready to fly from Winter season
A private chartered plane was set to fly from Sharjah some time ago. A leading Dubai FM radio advertised extensively for a month about this news. Finally this too could not take off. The reason was that the plane was too old to fly. Thank God, it did not fly!
Well, the purpose of this update is, we at Daijiworld are being flooded with a number of messages every day. Some people ask questions as if Daijiworld is responsible for operating the flights! But we feel proud because they depend on us for the authentic and latest information and they place immense trust in us.
In the meantime, we would like to remind the readers that efforts are on, and no one has lost hopes. And our hopes are very much alive. And the day first flight hovers over Mangalore, perhaps a long-awaited mission will have been completed.
Just start counting days from today on !
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