‘Work on the project had got stalled due to winter’
Srinagar: Divisional Commissioner Kashmir P K Pole Thursday said that the work on the three-kilometre run way on Srinagar-Jammu national highway in Bijbehera area of South Kashmir’s Anantnag by the Indian Air Force (IAF) is not a new project and rather an old project that got stalled due to the winter.
“There is no connection of work on three-kilometre runway in South Kashmir by the IAF with Indo-China standoff. This has no link with any other issue. It was an old project on which work was suspended due to the winter,” Pole said.
Amid the India-China stand-off in Ladakh, the Indian Air Force (IAF) has started construction of a 3-kilometer long runway along the Srinagar-Jammu National Highway (NH-44) in Bijbehara area of district Anantnag.
The construction work started on Monday and is going on fast pace. “The runway is being constructed by the Air Force,” Major General, A Sengupta, General Officer Commanding (GOC), Awantipora-based Victor Force had stated while addressing a press conference. Sources told KNO that emergency landing and runway strip was under construction.
The Indian Air Force (IAF) has started construction of a 3-kilometer long runway adjacent to the National Highway NH-44 in Bijbehara area of South Kashmir.
The construction of the emergency landing facility comes at a time when there is military standoff along Line of Actual Control (LAC) between Indian Army and Peoples Liberation Army of China.
An official said that it would be three kilometer long and will act as emergency runway facility for fighter jets in case of any emergency.
The passes for the construction of the runway to the trucks and workers were issued by the district administration.
A top security official told news website The Kashmiriyat that the ‘Emergency Strip’ has nothing to do with the current standoff between India and China along the Line of actual control. He said that the runways have been built in other parts of Jammu Kashmir and in other Indian states as well.
The runway being built on the Srinagar-Jammu Highway near Sangam in Islamabad (anantnag) district on the NH 44 is nearly 3.5-km-long and currently the level of the strip is being regularized.
Sources said that the work is being done under the dark of the night after labourers were given special passes to work. The project work is being done by a South Kashmir based construction company.
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