Congress MLA suggests returning Shivamogga Airport land to farmers, later backtracks his statement

Sagar MLA Belur Gopal Krishna speaking at a press conference in Shivamogga on Thursday.

Sagar MLA Belur Gopal Krishna of the Congress has suggested returning the land acquired for the Shivamogga Airport to its original owners, as flight operations are expected to come to a halt from November 21.

Addressing a press conference in Shivamogga on Thursday, Mr. Gopal Krishna said the airport, inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was in a bad state. “Now, they are blaming the State government for the present status. But why can’t they extend UDAN? Their only intention is to hand over all airports to private companies. In my opinion, we don’t require an airport. Let the land acquired for the project be returned to the farmers,” he said.

Hinting at BJP leaders, he said, “You have purchased vast tracts of land close to the airport. You wanted the airport to increase the value of your property, not for benefiting the people.”

However, after a barrage of questions from journalists, he changed his line of argument and said the airport had been inaugurated by Mr. Modi. In honour of the Prime Minister, he said, both the State and Central governments should work towards retaining the airport and relaunching services.

R.M. Manjunath Gowda, president of the Shivamogga District Central Cooperative Bank, said flight operations were badly hit by recent changes in the policy on handling operations. That was why IndiGo stopped its services connecting Bengaluru and Shivamogga, he said. “That is the root cause of the problem,” he added.