Cultural Pursuits - Traveling a little differently!

Assam Getting There

By plane

Your main arrival to Assam is at Guwahati's Lokapriya Gopinath Bordoloi International Airport - with other smaller airports in Dibrugarh, Silchar, Tezpur and Jorhat: The major airlines operating in the region are:

• Jet Airways [1]
• Kingfisher Airlines [2]
• Indian Airlines [3]
• Jetlite [4]
• Spicejet [5]
• Air Deccan[6]
• Indigo Airlines [7]

For the international travellers from East and or South Asia it is best to come via Kolkata.  There are several direct flights to Guwahati, Dibrugarh, Silchar and Jorhat.  Kolkata to Guwahati is less than 45 minutes flying time, while Dibrugarh )the eastern most civil airpor in Assam) is around 90 minutes.

If you are coming from other countries it may be more convenient to fly from Delhi or Mumbai - it is about 2:30 hrs flying time direct - Delhi to Guwahati.

By rail

Assam is also well connected through Rail Services to Indian cities. Three major routes of North East Frontier Railways (NF Railways) cover Assam and provide linkages to principal zones and cities in north, east and south India. Guwahati railway station is the largest in Assam and is served by direct trains from most of the major cities in India. The Rajdhani Express (fully airconditioned) from New Delhi (takes 27 hours) and Saraighat Express from Howrah in Kolkata (takes 17 hours) are the fastest ones. There are many direct trains from Delhi (including the Rajdhani Express) and Kolkata for Dibrugarh in Upper Assam. Usually, Dibrugarh is an additional nights journey (12hrs) from Guwahati.

By Road

There are highways from Indian states in the west and buses run between Siliguri (to Siliguri buses are available from Kolkata, Darjeeling and Gangtok) and Guwahati; However, travelling by bus may not be comfortable in this patch and travel time is usually longer than that of trains. Road connectivity to surrounding Seven Sister States is good, however may take different durations depending on the location of the state.

Tamu in western Myanmar is connected to a reasonably good highway to Assam via Manipur; Tamu in Myanmar border is closer to Mandalay. The historic Stilwell Road between Assam-Myanmar-China from Ledo in Upper Assam to Myitkina in Myanmar and further to Kunming in China is right now not fully operationalised.

There are also roads connecting Bhutan.