Legendary Dakota (DC-3) VT-AUI aircraft will be preserved at a special area of Bhubaneswar’s Biju Patnaik International Airport, which bears the name of the chief minister of Odisha.
Former politician and aviator Shri Biju Patnaik’s dismantled Dakota aircraft was transported from Kolkata to Bhubaneswar where Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik paid floral tribute to the aircraft that carried memories of his father. Three lorries transported the disassembled parts of the aeroplane from Kolkata’s Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport to the capital of Odisha, where they will be put back together, under the protection of the Odisha Police. Following that, the Dakota (DC-3) VT-AUI plane will be stored in a specific location at the international airport here that bears the name of Biju Patnaik, the father of the chief minister of Odisha.
“I am delighted that this legendary aircraft of Biju Babu has finally returned here,” CM Shri Naveen Patnaik said.
Former chief minister of Odisha Biju Patnaik established Kalinga Airlines in the 1940s, which had 12 aircraft, four of which were Dakotas. The CM claimed that his father, who passed away in 1997, had several famous escapades with Dakota aircraft.
“The greatest of them was when he flew to Indonesia through Dutch blockades and the only other person in the aircraft was my mother who was a co-pilot. They rescued the then Indonesian prime minister Sutan Sjahrir (in April 1947),” he said.
But according to historian Anil Dhir, the Dakota that was shipped from Kolkata wasn’t the one that Biju Patnaik used to save the Indonesian president at Jawaharlal Nehru’s request. For the achievement, a grateful Indonesia twice awarded Biju Patnaik with the highest civilian honour, the “Bhumiputra.”
The aircraft that was transported to Odisha was abandoned on the airport grounds in Kolkata for many years. Slogans like “Biju Patnaik Amar Rahe” permeated the air as the 64-foot-long aircraft, which weighed over 8 tonnes, arrived in Bhubaneswar.
Several ministers, MLAs, members of the aviation sector, as well as many others, gathered at the Biju Patnaik International Airport (BPIA) to greet the Dakota plane in addition to Naveen Patnaik. Sulochana Das, the mayor of Bhubaneswar, was also present.
To put the aircraft’s disassembled parts back together, the government of Odisha has hired a specialised crew. At the BPIA, 1.1 acres of land have been allocated for this use by the Airports Authority of India.
According to BPIA director Prasanna Pradhan, the aircraft has experienced significant wear and tear over the years. Earlier in the day, hundreds of people gathered next to the National Highway that runs between Kolkata and Bhubaneswar to see the Dakota aircraft being disassembled.
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