Sources from airport said that today no ticket was available from Agartala to Calcutta at costs of Rs 5800.00 while in Indigo airlines flights the fare till Saturday evening was Rs 7862.00
KRC TIMES NE Desk
Agartala: The high rise effected by airport authority of India in user development fees and aviation security collected from passengers have created serious problems for people of Agartala travelling to Calcutta by air. Earlier in the old terminal Bhawan in the airport the user development fees was only Rs 350.00 but by a latest decision this has been raised to Rs 797.00 .
Apart from this , Rs 236 extra is extracted from passengers in the name of aviation security . Both these are added to the actual fare which goes beyond the rich of poor and middle-class passengers.
Sources from airport said that today no ticket was available from Agartala to Calcutta at costs of Rs 5800.00 while in Indigo airlines flights the fare till Saturday evening was Rs 7862.00. Similiarly on other days of the week also the fare rate is exorbitant by Indigo and Air India carriers.
Sources said that the current season is exam season as many students and their guardians go to Calcutta and onward to other places to take competitive exams for admission to higher educational institutions and then return.
So the rush is quite heavy. What is most surprising is that in December 2021 the state government had brought down the VAT on aviation turbine fuel from 16% to only 1% but this has had hardly any impact on high air fare imposed by the unscrupulous airlines.
Besides, in other state capital airports in the country flights run by various companys run and there is a competitiveness in the fare collected from passengers but here at Agartala only the Indigo and Air India operate flights.
Apart from this, the train service between Agartala and Calcutta is also few and far between . Earlier only one express train would run between Agartala and Calcutta’s Sealdah but there has been no change in the schedule so far in the matter of running trains , so many people who otherwise would have travelled by train are forced to have recourse to air travel at high cost due to emergency reasons.
The harassed and exploited passengers now demand that the state government take up the twin issues with the union ministry of civil aviation as well as with the union railway ministry so that people including passengers to Calcutta for education , medical treatment, business and other reasons can have some relief.
