- Name: Cooch Behar Airport
- IATA code: COH
- ICAO code: VECO
- Latitude: 26.333332
- Longitude: 89.46667
- Time Zone: UTC/GMT+5:30
Update:
Inauguration ceremony by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has been fixed for 19th July 2011: she’ll lay the foundation stone for the new airport terminal. Air services will resume on regular basis from mid-August 2011.
The airport was closed almost over two decades back, due to renovation and beautification works by the Airports Authority of India. No such maintenance work ever takes this much of time to complete but still, reopening has been delayed due to several technical and non-technical reasons over the last four years. A few attempts to restart operations failed.
But it seems that the long wait is finally over, with the change in 34-yrs-long political leadership in the state, the new Chief Minister of West Bengal has seriously taken up efforts to reopen the airport and resume flight operations soon. Hopefully within a few week’s time, COH/VECO will again see planes happily landing and taking off.
The airport is not only commercially important, but it is also strategically a very important point for the Indian Army. The two other nearest airports are both situated far away in the hills, one in Bagdogra and another in Guwahati.
At a time when the new Chief Minister has expressed her wish to carry on beautification work in North Bengal so that people love it and it also attracts tourism, a reopening of the airport in Coochbehar will definitely be a solid step ahead in the right direction.
Ad SMS spamming
A story of porting
