Buddha Air to operate flights on Kathmandu-Kolkata route from today

Kathmandu, May 26

Buddha Air is all set to start flights in the Kathmandu-Kolkata sector from Monday. Organising a press meet today, the airline company announced that it will operate three flights a week from Monday in the aforementioned route.

“We plan to operate flights on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays in the first phase and after looking at the market demand we might increase the number of flights in the future,” said Birendra Basnet, managing director of Buddha Air.

Basnet further said the main target for launching the flight is to provide easy air connectivity to passengers of both countries for trade, pilgrimage, holiday and other purposes. “The flight to Kolkata will depart the Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) at 8am till June and once the runway rehabilitation works are completed the flight will be rescheduled to 7am,” he added.

Similarly, the flight from Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose Airport in Kolkata will depart for Kathmandu at 10:15am local time.

As per Basnet, the airfare for a round trip will cost Rs 22,000.

The airline will operate its 72-seater ATR 72-500 aircraft for the flights.

He also informed that the company is preparing to operate flights to Guwahati in northeastern India too. “We have submitted all the required documents to the Airports Authority of India and are now waiting for their response. If everything goes as per plan the flights to Guwahati from Kathmandu will begin within two months,” Basnet added.

Meanwhile, the company has conducted Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) at Janakpur airport today. The IFR helps aircraft to operate flights regardless of any weather condition. Runway light, dim light, fog light and taxi-way light help the aircraft to clear their visibility.

Similarly, the airline will operate two flights a day to Surkhet from June 16.

Basnet further mentioned that the company is waiting for the Nepalgunj airport to be upgraded as an international airport. The Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal had permitted the airline to operate commercial flights from Nepalgunj to New Delhi last year, however, the airport is in the construction phase at the moment.

Currently, Buddha Air has a fleet of seven 72 ATR 72-500s, three ATR 42-300s and two 18-seater Beechcraft 1900Ds aircraft. At present, it operates scheduled flights to Nepalgunj, Bhairahawa, Bharatpur, Simara, Janakpur, Biratnagar, Bhadrapur, Pokhara, Dhangadhi and Tumlingtar from TIA. Similarly, in the international segment the company is operating a daily commercial flight to Varanasi in India from Kathmandu.

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