Bihar launching air taxi service for Buddhist sites

The government in Bihar is starting air taxi sevices to ferry tourists to different tourist sites scattered across the state, a senior state tourism department official said.

“We have planned to launch air taxi services to link various Buddhist sites scattered across Bihar”, state tourism department principal secretary Rashmi Verma said.

The system is expected to start from the next year.

The official said to begin with, the air taxi will be operational between the places where the airstrips are available.

Authorities said they were encouraged to start this project owing to the increasing number of foreigners visiting Bihar and the inconveniences being faced by them in reaching the tourist sites.

As per an official report, a total of 3,56,446 foreign tourists visited Bihar in 2008-09.

In 2007-08, their number was 1,77,362. In 2006-07, their number remained at 94,446 while in 2005-06, a total of 63,301 foreign tourists visited Bihar for sightseeing.