Connectivity issues may stall plan to use Hindon base

The government's plan to use the Hindon Air Force base near Ghaziabad for regional routes is likely to face legal hurdles and operational challenges because of increased costs and poor connectivity. Airlines are also likely to oppose this move of the government, aimed to reduce traffic at the Delhi airport, because of implementation difficulties.

Poor last-mile connectivity between Delhi and Hindon and the Air Force’s own operational requirements (which can limit civilian flights) are the other major issues the airlines would have to deal with first before starting operations. “You cannot expect a passenger to take a regional flight to Hindon, then travel an hour in a cab to catch his next flight, which will be from Delhi airport,” said an executive of an airline that will participate in the second round of the bidding process. “It will defeat the entire purpose of UDAN, of building seamless air connectivity with the hinterland. Multimodal connectivity through a fast mode of transport has to be developed first.”

The Indian Air Force has agreed to allow the use of Hindon base for regional flights from winter, Civil Aviation Secretary R N Choubey said last week. The air force station is located close to Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh.

The state support agreement that the government signed with a GMR-led consortium while privatising the Delhi airport gives the right of first refusal to the GMR group for any airport built within 150 km of the Indira Gandhi International Airport. “This leads to the question, what is going to be the status of the Hindon airport. The issue will need to be legally examined. The GMR-led consortium cannot bid for it as it is a defence airport,” said an industry source.

IndiGo is planning a huband-spoke model with their regional and mainline operations, which will face difficulty if it has to operate from Hindon. “Defence airports have their own hurdles, you have to adhere to watch hours, which is not always convenient for commercial operations,” a senior airline official said.

Hindon base houses the heavy duty C-17 Globemaster of the Indian Air Force and has a single runway.

The GMR group, IndiGo and SpiceJet spokesperson did not respond to queries.