Bhubaneswar: Budget-carrier IndiGo will start direct flight services between Bhubaneswar and Varanasi from Saturday.
The 72-seater daily flight is scheduled to depart from Biju Patnaik International Airport here at 9:45 PM and land at Varanasi around 11:40 PM.
It will leave Varanasi at 7.35 PM and reach the Odisha capital at 9.25 PM.
The fare from Bhubaneswar to Varanasi on February 29, according to the IndiGo official website, is ₹3,335.
The IndiGo had received the required go ahead from the Director General of Civil Aviation in January this year.
The direct Bhubaneswar-Varanasi connectivity has brought cheers to the travel and tour operators in the state, apart from pilgrims and the common citizen, who had been long demanding a direct service between the two cities. “Varanasi is a vital link for the development of Buddhist tourism in Odisha, especially drawing pilgrims from Kathmandu who make Varanasi their base and then travel to other Buddhist places including Odisha,” said founder of Bhubaneswar-based Travel Link Benjamin Simon.
In May 2017, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had sought the inclusion of Bhubaneswar in Air India’s Varanasi-Colombo circuit. He had also drawn attention to a Buddhist conclave where academicians and monks from Sri Lanka had expressed keen desire to visit Odisha and explore the Buddhist heritage sites.
Alliance Air, a subsidiary of Air India, had started direct flight service between Jharsuguda and Varanasi via Bhubaneswar on January 31.
