Flight services to Northeast normal; Northeast Frontier Railway cancels 71 trains

* Availability of petrol, diesel and LPG expected to be normal in a day or two

GUWAHATI/AGARTALA: With the situation improving in Assam and other north-eastern States which witnessed violent agitations last week over the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019, all the 10 airports in the region were operational on Sunday, officials said.

The Airport Authority of India's (AAI) Regional Executive Director, Sanjeev Jindal, said: "We are working in all the airports of the northeastern region on Sunday and some were also open for passengers overnight on Saturday. Even if there is no flight, we are allowing the passengers to use guesthouses, lounges, water, heating and are trying to provide food as well."

He said that till Saturday, the Dibrugarh Airport in Assam was not operational due to the unavailability of adequate private and public transport services. But on Sunday, it functioned normally and all the nine scheduled flights were being operated. Jindal said that other airports in Guwahati, Silchar, Jorhat, Teju, Tezpur (all in Assam), Agartala (Tripura), Imphal (Manipur), Dimapur (Nagaland) and Lengpui (Mizoram) were also operating normally.

"Challenges are there for men and material but all stakeholders are working hard in close coordination and serving the people for their safe movement in and out of the north-eastern region," Jindal said.

Meanwhile, the following flights were cancelled from Guwahati airports on Sunday: Indigo 6E: 596 to Kolkata; 6E-112 to Agartala; 6E- 119 (From Agartala); 6E- 694 Del-Gau; KB- Druk Air-Paro; and the Air India 891 Del-Gau-Del, stated a release.

However, the Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR), which operates in the entire north-eastern region and in some parts of Bihar and West Bengal, has cancelled 71 trains on Sunday due to security and other reasons.

An NFR official said that due to security and technical reasons besides inadequate road transport services, they were not operating the 71 trains.

"The Kamakhya-Ranchi Express and the Kishanganj-Ajmer Gareeb Nawaz Express would also remain cancelled on December 17. Because of law and order problem between New Farakka and Azimganj section of the Eastern Railway in West Bengal, six trains had to be cancelled on Sunday and the New Alipurduar-Sealdah Tista Torsa Express was short terminated at Raninagar Jalpiguri," the official said.

Chief Public Relations Officer Subhanan Chanda said that the NFR had run four special trains between Guwahati, Dibrugarh, Dimapur and other places of Northeast and carried about 2,400 stranded passengers to their destinations since December 12. (IANS)

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