Gurugram Airstrip

Gurugram Airstrip (formerly Gurgaon Airstrip), also Bhondsi Airstrip and Silokhera Airstrip, is an airstrip located between Silokhera and Bhondsi villages, 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) south of Gurugram city center, in Haryana state of India.[1][2][3][4]

Gurugram Airstrip.

Gurugram Vimantal

गुरुग्राम विमानपट्टी
Summary
Airport typePublic
OwnerCivil Aviation Department, Haryana
ServesGurugram, Haryana
LocationBhondsi
Time zoneIST (UTC+05:30)
Coordinates28°25′12″N 77°7′38″E
Websitewww.haraviation.gov.in
Map
Gurugram Airstrip
Location of airport in India
Gurugram Airstrip
Gurugram Airstrip (India)
Statistics
Hub for the number of airlines0
Number of scheduled airlines flying in0
Number of scheduled weekly flights0
Number of scheduled flight passengers0
Number of runways1
Airports and seaports in India

History

Air strip
See also: Airports in Haryana, Aviation history of Haryana, Civil Aviation History of India, World Aviation History, Aviation in India, and Haryana Institute of Civil Aviation

In 1948, first airstrip was built in Haryana when Ambala Air Force Station was established. During 1980s, the airstrip, hangar, air conditioned yoga ashram and TV studio were built by former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's favorite godman and yoga guru Dhirendra Brahmachari who died in 1994 in a plane crash.[4] Indira use to visit Brahmachari here once a week.[4] The 1980s teleserials "India Quiz" and Hum Log (ran from July 1984 to 17 December 1985) were shot here.[4] Brahmachari charged INR25,000 per shift for the use of ashram's TV studio facilities here for the shooting of Hum Log.[4] In 1983, Brahmachari had written letter to then Chief Minister of Haryana, Bhajan Lal, with a request to acquire 5,000 acre land around Aravalli Range, potentially up to 70,000 acres in total, to build facilities to rival Disneyland, including a yoga research and training centre, a wildlife sanctuary, folk arts and crafts centre, amusement centre and other facilities such as helipad, aquarium, planetarium and games and thrillers.[5] The aircraft hangar still has two ruined aircraft belonging to Brahmachari, likely including a Maule M-5 American aircraft owned by him that landed him in investigations for tax evasions.[6]

This airstrip lies near the "Bharat Yatra Kendra" "Bhondsi ashram" set up by the former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar in 1983 on 600 acre of panchayat land, where another godman Chandraswami and godman's associate Adnan Khashoggi (a Saudi Arabian billionaire international arms dealer embroiled in various scandals) use to visit him.[7][8][9] Before 2002, some of the government land of the ashram was taken back by the Government of Haryana on the instructions of then Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala (in office 1989-91 and 1999-2004).[10] In 2002, Supreme Court of India returned most of the land, barring some land, to the Bhondsi gram panchayat.[11]

Facilities

It has a kilometre-long runway and an aircraft hangar large enough for 3 aircraft.[4]

Current status

This airstrip is included in the Airport Authority of India's UDAN-RCS regional connectivity scheme to inaugurate new flight routes from the unserved airports in India.[1][2][3]

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See also

References
  1. "List of Unserved RCS airports." Archived 1 December 2017 at the Wayback Machine, Airport Authority of India, November 2016.
  2. "Details of Unserved RCS airports.", Airport Authority of India, November 2016.
  3. UDAN-RCS Plan (final version, 2016), Government of India, 2016.
  4. 1990, "The Illustrated Weekly of India.", The Times Group, Volume 111, Issues 13-25, p. 35.
  5. "Swami's Disneyland.", India Today, 28 February 1983.
  6. "Dhirendra Brahmachari: The controversial yogi.", India Today, 30 November 1980.
  7. 1996, "India Today", - Volume 21, Issues 7-12, p. 122.
  8. "Creating a stir.", India Today, 28 February 1991.
  9. "An escape to nature in the backyard of Gurgao.", Hindustan Times, 20 June 2017.
  10. 2003, "Outlook.", Volume 43, Issues 47-51, p. 102.
  11. "Name ashram after former PM Chandra Shekhar: Harsh Vardhan., Times of India, 17 June 2017.
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