The first flight from Delhi to Ludhiana is set to land at the newly established Halwara civil terminal on Friday morning, marking the commencement of operations at the new Ludhiana airport.
Air India’s A320 aircraft, with a capacity of 160 passengers, will land at Halwara and be given a “water cannon salute”, a ceremonial aviation tradition in which fire tenders spray water to form an arch over the aircraft to welcome a new flight.
The Halwara terminal, developed by expanding the Indian Air Force (IAF) base, has been completed after missing several deadlines over the past eight years. The project was approved by the Punjab Cabinet in December 2018.
The BJP-led Centre is set to turn the arrival of the first flight into a show of strength ahead of the 2027 Punjab Assembly polls.
Union Minister of State and senior BJP leader Ravneet Singh Bittu will be among the first passengers to land at Halwara from Delhi. Speaking to The Indian Express, Bittu hinted that along with him, “some of the Rajya Sabha members who recently shifted from Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) to BJP, including Vikramjit Sahney, Rajinder Gupta and Ashok Mittal, might also travel”.
Around 40-50 local BJP leaders from Ludhiana have also reached Delhi to board the inaugural flight to Halwara. “All those who could reach Delhi at short notice to catch the early morning flight will be there,” said Bittu.
Meanwhile, celebrations in the ruling AAP camp have been dampened by the absence of senior minister and Ludhiana West MLA Sanjeev Arora, who was recently arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in an alleged money laundering case. Arora and his wife had booked tickets for the inaugural flight, but he is currently in ED custody.
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Arora had been actively pursuing the Halwara airport project and had claimed that it was due to the efforts of the AAP government that the airport had finally become operational after years of delay.
Till the filing of this report, there was no confirmation on whether any senior AAP leader or Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann would attend the arrival or departure ceremonies of the first flight on Friday.
AAP’s Raikot MLA Hakam Singh Thekedar, in whose constituency the airport falls, said: “The airport is mainly under the Centre, but we are extremely happy that flights are finally taking off. I haven’t received any schedule as of now on whether the CM will be coming tomorrow. I will discuss it with the deputy commissioner and go if required since the airport is in my constituency.”
Water cannon salute, roses for passengers on Day 1
Speaking to The Indian Express, Jagir Singh, chief executive officer of the Halwara terminal deputed by the Airports Authority of India (AAI), said: “The first flight is expected to land at 7.05 am from Delhi. We will be giving a water cannon salute to the first flight. Fire tenders will spray water on the aircraft to mark the milestone. Also, passengers on both arrival and departure flights will be given rose sticks. Refreshments will also be served at the airport.”
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“We have deputed eight staff members at the Halwara terminal. They have been shifted from the Sahnewal domestic airport, which is now non-functional,” said Singh.
Flight schedule
According to the schedule released by Air India, two round trips will operate daily. The morning flight will take off from Delhi at 5.55 am and land at Halwara at 7.05 am. It will then depart from Halwara at 7.55 am and land in Delhi at 9.10 am.
For the second round trip, the flight will depart from Delhi at 12.55 pm and land at Halwara at 2.10 pm. The last flight of the day will depart from Halwara at 2.40 pm and land in Delhi at 3.55 pm.
The one-hour-and-15-minute flight each way will cost around Rs 4,000-4,500 per passenger, according to online ticket prices.
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“The flight schedule has been designed to offer same-day connectivity via Delhi to destinations across the United Kingdom and the rest of Europe, among others. With this, passengers from Halwara/Ludhiana and surrounding areas can conveniently travel with Air India to Delhi and take seamless onward connections through the same terminal to destinations such as London, Birmingham, Rome, Milan, and Paris on a single ticket, with baggage through-checked to their final destinations,” Air India said in a press release issued on April 2.
Several deadlines missed
The civil terminal, with a capacity to handle 300 passengers at a time — 150 each for arrival and departure — has been constructed at a cost of nearly Rs 54 crore in Aitiana village of Raikot subdivision in Ludhiana district by expanding the IAF base in Halwara.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had virtually inaugurated the terminal on February 1. The terminal was a long-pending demand of businessmen and traders in Ludhiana, which lacked air connectivity after operations at the old Sahnewal domestic airport were shut due to infrastructural issues.
Though the Congress-led Punjab government approved the project in 2018, paucity of funds stalled construction several times. The terminal was eventually constructed by the Punjab government’s Public Works Department (PWD) and later handed over to the AAI.
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While successive governments, including the current AAP-led dispensation and the previous Congress government, have projected Halwara as an “international” facility, it is likely to take several years before that becomes a reality. For now, it will operate only as a domestic airport.
Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann has proposed to the Centre that the airport be named after Ghadhar revolutionary Kartar Singh Sarabha, who was hanged by the British at the age of 19.
