Airport expansion to see investment of ₹1L crore in 5 yrs

NEWDELHI: The aviation sector in India is likely to see investment of ₹1 lakh crore in the next few years in order to increase the capacity of airports.

On Wednesday, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs gave its approval for expansion and upgradation of integrated terminals at Chennai, Guwahati and Lucknow airports.

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) also said that they are working on the upgradation of several other airports.

“Expansion work is already in progress at Chennai, Guwahati, Lucknow, Agartala, Patna, Srinagar, Pune, Trichy, Vijaywada, Port Blair, Jaipur, Mangaluru, Dehradun, Jabalpur, Kolhapur, Goa, Rupsi, Leh, Calicut, Imphal, Varanasi and Bhubaneswar while works have already been awarded for Agartala, Calicut, Port Blair and Guwahati. On the airside infrastructure, extension and the strengthening of runways, and the construction of new apron bays in order to cater to demand from airline operators who have placed orders for 900 air crafts in the next 10 years is also planned by AAI,” said AAI chairman Guruprasad Mohapatra.

The AAI will require capex of ₹20,178 crore in the next 4-5 years. At private and joint venture airports, an investment of ₹25,000 crore is planned in the next five years. Apart from this, Greenfield airports are also being planned in Navi Mumbai, Mopa in Goa, Jewar in NCR, Bhogapuram in Andhra Pradesh, Dholera in Ahmadabad, Hirasar in Gujarat, and Purandar (Pune) at a cost of ₹50,000 crore.

At the Lucknow airport, the new integrated terminal will have an area of 88,000 sqm along with the existing terminal building (with 16,292 sqm), and will have an annual capacity to handle 2.6 million international and 11 million domestic passenger traffic. The new terminal building would cater to the requirement of passenger growth up to 2030-31.