It is almost four years since the Union Cabinet had declared Srinagar as an International Airport and a project at a cost of Rs.80 crores was sanctioned to upgrade the terminal for handling international flights. The work had been started with great fanfare and it was announced that the flights to various international destinations will start operating from July, 2006. However, in spite of the fact that the project was supposed to get top priority, it kept on dragging slowly. Almost half a dozen new dates were announced by no less a person than the Union Minister of Civil Aviation who visited the place at least three to four times to personally inspect the work and get it speeded up. In fact, during the last visit in July, 2008, the firm implementing the project was even threatened with black-listing if they fail to complete the work within a month or so. It was declared by the then Chief Minister and the Union Minister of Water Resources that the flights will start by the end of August. It had been decided that to begin with Srinagar-Dubai direct flight would be started. Air India Dubai had even started identifying potential travellers on the route. I was personally contacted by Air India Dubai to give them a list of Kashmiris residing in Dubai so that they could be contacted for making use of the new facility. Recently a senior officer of Air India informed me that all arrangements for operating the Srinagar-Dubai flight had been finalised. According to him, the flight will be operated on the direct routing Dubai-Srinagar-Dubai. The aircraft would be based in Dubai. It will be an Airbus 321. It will depart Dubai 10 am local time and reach Srinagar 2.30 pm local time. It will return from Srinagar at 3.30 pm local time and reach Dubai at 5 pm local time. The flight is expected to be operated thrice weekly on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The Airline will also try to have a Dubai-Jeddah connection to make the flight commercially viable by operating Umra groups from Srinagar. Keeping in view the keen desire of the people to perform Umra there will be sufficient load for the flight if it is operated with the Jeddah connection. This traffic will be on round the year basis. At the present moment Air India is operating direct flights from Srinagar to Jeddah during Hajj. Earlier these flights were operated via Sharjah with an hour long refuelling stop there. However, during the current season these were operated direct. I had also been given to understand that the Dubai flights will be started from January, 2009. However, there does not seem any visible activity at the present moment in this behalf. One would have expected by now all preparations for starting such an event. There seems to be some other hidden hitch now!

With the start of the first flight from Srinagar to Dubai, a gateway would have been opened to many more destinations. Jeddah, Muscat, Kuwait, Doha, and Bahrain in Persian Gulf are all almost equidistant from Kashmir. The flight durations would be 3 to 4 ½ hours to most of the above mentioned destinations. There would be two way traffic on all these routes. Arabs with families coming for holidays in hot summers and Kashmiris going out for Umra and shopping during winters. In addition all these flights would be able to carry lot of cargo from Kashmir especially handicrafts, fruit, vegetables, flowers, and possibly trout fish.

Once a region gets going with direct flights from Kashmir, other regions like South East Asia and Central Asia could be explored. Kashmir has had trade links with Central Asia from the earliest times. It was an important hub on the branch of Silk Route touching India. Caravans of traders used to frequent Srinagar through Gurez as well as Leh coming from Yarqand, Samarqand, and Kashgar. This possibility has been repeatedly pointed out in a number of seminars held about Silk Route in the Central Asian Department of the University of Kashmir. In fact last year also a seminar was held in the University in which a large number of scholars and experts from almost all the Central Asian countries participated. The need for reviving the Silk Road connection of Kashmir was emphasised. It was pointed out that it may not be easy to revive the old caravan route due to disuse of ancient trails but on the pattern of Chinese Government, the revival of an “Aerial Silk Route” could be considered. The Chinese are going ahead at full speed to convert Urumqi Airport into an International Airport to make it a hub of the proposed Aerial Silk Route. A recent article in a Tourism related magazine states, “The globalization of the world economy has made a significant impact on the transportation of goods, as well as that of passengers, because air travel reduces distance through its speed. At a June 2006 meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), Central Asian States and China launched a proposal for an East-West air corridor. This plan aims to reap the benefits of the central geographic location of Xinjiang and of the Central Asian States, and to create an "Aerial Silk Road”. Urumqi, by 2015 will be able to accommodate over 16 million tourists and foreign businessmen, and to manage 150,000 takeoffs and landings annually. To give rise to an Aerial Silk Road, several Chinese, Japanese, and Korean harmonization projects and carrier alliances -- along the lines of what is now happening between European airlines -- have been proposed”. We have a similar situation in Kashmir. If we are able to connect Srinagar with some of the Central Asian capitals through direct flights which would again be of 2 to 4 hours duration, Kashmir will get a tremendous boost both in tourism and trade. It would also help us to revive the broken cultural links and will greatly help in removing the alienation which Kashmiris feel with outsiders especially from the southern part of the sub-continent.

Similarly, South East Asia has been a regular contributor of visitors to Kashmir in the most difficult last two decades. In spite of all the troubles and continuous turmoil none of the countries from this region have issued any adverse travel advisories on Kashmir. We have been getting groups from Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, and Malaysia. Earlier these were mostly budgeted travellers and sometimes of Indian origin but for last couple of years up market groups of natives are coming. In fact, there are regular Malaysian groups of higher income tourists who have been staying in the only top level hotel in Srinagar. To attract up market tourists, Srinagar would definitely need properties of some of the world class hospitality chains which can be set up by local entrepreneurs as joint ventures. Once Srinagar comes on the international air route maps, there will be an unprecedented boost to foreign tourism. However, to make all these goals achievable, one has to give a start to the direct international traffic. This can only happen when the people at the helm in Civil Aviation are motivated to give push to this long pending project. In fact, it may be more fruitful to the people giving calls for various “Chalos” to give a call for something substantial which can be practical and achievable and make a difference to overall economic situation of Kashmir. Freedom is of many kinds and one of these is the economic freedom which is felt and directly experienced by one and all more substantially. Let us hope the new rulers do not have to wait for a “Chalo” call and earnestly try to start this illusive and long awaited international flight from Kashmir!