International airport in NOIDA

The Uttar Pradesh government continues to demand a new airport at Jewar, in the same district as NOIDA and only 100 km from the Delhi International Airport (DIAL). In 2001, Rajnath Singh, now the Union Home Minister and then UP chief minister, first proposed an airport there, as did Mayawati after she became CM in 2007. This did not make progress because of a clause in the agreement with GMR, preventing the establishment of a new airport within 150 km of IGIA. However, Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha has said, that “within a few years, we will be using all of the capacity (at Delhi). It is necessary for us to build a new airport”, while planning for increasing of capacity at the Delhi airport terminals would depend on improvement in airside capacity. “What we agree on is that airside movement will have a bearing on the building of a new terminal. With Delhi having three runways, it gives us significant capacity to increase the airside movement”. According to the minister, the improvement in airside capacity would lead to the addition of around 70 flights and thus, IGIA’s passenger handling capacity would increase to around 90 million annually, from the current 62 mn, in the next two to three years.