Air Canada should provide direct Air connectivity from Vancouver &Toronto to Amritsar

Amritsar, April 19 (Punjab Post Bureau) – Amritsar Vikas Manch an NGO, committed for the overall development of Amritsar, has welcomed the proposed visit of Harjit Singh Sajjan, Defence Minister of Canada to Sri Harmandir Sahib. The Manch President Sh. Kulwant Singh Ankhi and Patron Dr. Charanjit Singh Gumtala in a statement has said that Mr. Sajjan has done a great pride to the Punjabis in the world. Mr. Ankhi while welcoming the Canadian Defence Minister to the city has strongly demanded that Air Canada should provide direct Air connectivity to Amitsar from Vancouver and Toronto. He said that there is no need for introducing new flight as Air Canada is already operating Delhi-Vancouver and Delhi-Toronto flights. Delhi – Toronto flight flyover Amritsar while going to Delhi and it can have 2 hour stop at Amritsar which comes earlier in route to Delhi. The Vancouver – Delhi flight can be extended as Vancouver – Delhi- Amritsar flights.  The Manch president has strongly urged Mr. Harjit Singh Sajjan to persuade upon Air Canada to give a stopover at Amritsar to these flights between Delhi & Toronto/Vancouver. He said that 90% passengers of these flights are Punjabis and it will be more convenient for them to land at Amritsar. The potential of Amritsar Airport can also be judged from the fact that every Jet Airways flight from Delhi to Toronto has more than 70-80% Punjabis travelling in it besides Air Canada’s Delhi – Toronto & Delhi – Vancouver flights which are also getting more than 80% Punjabis in these flights. Even Delhi – San Francisco flight of Air India has more than 60% Punjabis in these flights. Every Punjabi will prefer Amritsar to Delhi as it saves their time, money and 8 to 10 hours of troublesome journey from/to Delhi. There are about 2 million Punjabis in Toronto, Vancouver, New York and California that can also connect on these flights.

Moreover a large section of Punjabis travel by road to catch flights from Delhi. If we add this large section of Punjabis going by road to Delhi than the load factor at Amritsar airport can be more than 90% for USA, Canada, U.K Australia etc. Manch President and Patron has said that earlier from 2005 Air India started Amritsar-Birmingham-Toronto flight which was the most successful flight in the history of Air India. Very often some passengers had to be offloaded as the flight used to be overbooked. Manch leaders gave details of the number of passengers who travelled to Toronto on Delhi-Amritsar-Birmingham-Toronto and Delhi-Amritsar-London-Toronto from financial year 2006 till 2010. Data shows that 38K, 48K, 46K, 68K passengers boarded the flight from Amritsar rather than Delhi which was about 65-70% than the passengers boarding from Delhi to travel to Toronto. Even for Birmingham, more than 90% of the passengers boarded the flight from Amritsar. After the GMR company took over Delhi Airport, Air India withdrew these flights from Amritsar only to benefit GMR.

The Manch leaders strongly appealed to Shri Harjit Singh Sajjan Defence Minister Canada to approach Air Canada to introduce flights from Amritsar to Toronto & Vancouver.

Mr. Gumtala & Mr. Ankhi also strongly appealed to Mr. Sajjan to setup Deputy High Commission Office of Canada in the holy city of Amritsar for the benefit of Punjabis settled abroad. He is also requested to set up Trade Centre of Canadian government in Amritsar to bring more industry in the holy city.