To promote tourism, Heli-taxi service to start between Shimla and Chandigarh in an initiative by the Himachal Pradesh government and helicopter services provider Pawan Hans to reduce the travel time. On June 4, the service will be inaugurated by Chief minister Jai Ram Thakur at Shimla.
This kind of service was first introduced in Kullu, Shimla is the second city on the hill state to get connected aerially with Chandigarh. In the next 2 months- flights to Kolkata, Ahmedabad, and Indore.
On Sunday, the official spokesperson of Chandigarh International Airport, Depesh Joshi said to TOI– “every Monday and Friday, the Heli-taxi service will be available and the frequency will be increased by the authority after seeing the public response.“
A similar type of taxi service was started 15 years ago, but it failed to get much attention. Per person was charged Rs 2,500 as the fare. Later, a 20-seater ATR aircraft was introduced but it too met a similar fate. Therefore, it was called off after a short span of time.
The newly introduced chopper will sport a capacity of 20 seats and will charge a minimum fare of Rs.2,999 for every passenger. It will depart from Shimla at 8 am and arrive at Chandigarh at 8.20 am. The same chopper will depart from Chandigarh at 9 am and reach Shimla at 9.20 am, which means it will cover 120-km in just minutes. The good connectivity between Shimla and Chandigarh will promote hill tourism, Joshi added, as mentioned by the report.