Lagatar24 Desk
New Delhi, Dec 11: Three years after the island nation ended its services owing to Covid, Sri Lanka is planning to start flying again from the northern Jaffna peninsula to Chennai on Monday, a spokeswoman for the Sri Lankan Airport Authority said on Friday.
“The commercial flight operations from Chennai International airport to Jaffna International airport will be back effective 12th December 2022,” SLAA spokesperson Sumith de Silva told PTI.
“This will be a resumption of flights since they were stopped for Covid,” he added.
According to de Silva, India’s Alliance Air would fly four times a week between the two cities. Nimal Siripala de Silva, Sri Lanka’s minister of aviation, had earlier informed the legislature that flights between Jaffna and Chennai will begin running by December 12.
The runway still has to be improved in a few ways, though. Only 75-seater aircraft may currently use the runway.
In October 2019, the Jaffna international airport in Palaly, Sri Lanka, became the country’s third international airport and welcomed its inaugural aircraft from Chennai.
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Sri Lanka and India each contributed money toward the airport’s 2019 renovation. The primary source of foreign exchange profits for cash-strapped Sri Lanka is the tourism industry.
However, the pandemic’s start in 2020 significantly devastated Sri Lanka’s tourism industry, which was a key contributor to the country’s economic woes. The return of flights is anticipated to benefit the cash-strapped nation’s tourism industry and boost its struggling economy.
