Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Sikkim on September 23 to inaugurate the state’s first airport at Pakyong, a senior official has said. After inaugurating the airport, the prime minister will address a public meeting at St. Xaviers School ground at Pakyong and return to New Delhi the same day, Chief Secretary A K Shrivastava said after chairing a high-level meeting.

The greenfield airport, located 30km from here, will put Sikkim on the aviation map of the country. “I am very happy to share that the hon’ble prime minister is visiting Sikkim for the second time and this time he will be inaugurating the Pakyong Airport which is ready and has undergone trial on two occasions in the month of March, 2018,” the chief secretary said.

The state government has been intimated by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) and the Union Civil Aviation Ministry about the prime minister’s visit and the airport inauguration, he said.

After the formal inauguration of the airport on September 23, the commercial operation of flights will commence from the airport in the first week of October, the chief secretary said.