As many as 17 airports are currently operational in the northeast region.
Replying to Darjeeling Lok Sabha member Raju Bista’s question, Union Minister for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) G Kishan Reddy provided this information in the House on Monday.
As things stand today, the seven sister states of the northeast have airports at:
- Assam – Guwahati, Silchar, Dibrugarh, Jorhat, Tezpur, Lilabari, Rupsi
- Arunachal Pradesh – Pasighat, Tezu, Ziro, Hollangi
- Tripura – Agartala
- Manipur – Imphal
- Meghalaya – Shillong
- Nagaland – Dimapur
- Mizoram – Lengpui (Aizawl)
- Sikkim – Pakyong
The most recent airport is Donyi Polo Airport which was inaugurated in October 2022. The greenfield airport lies at Hollongi, 15 km from Itanagar, the capital of Arunachal Pradesh.
The state government has named the airport as “Donyi Polo Airport” to reflect the long-standing indigenous respect for the Sun (Donyi) and the Moon (Polo) among the populace.
The northeast has been an important component of air connectivity expansion.
To put this into perspective, in 2013, there were only nine airports in the northeast, which has now increased to 17. This means close to about eight new airports have been built in the last ten years.