CENTRE SCANS LAND NEAR AIRPORTS FOR AIRCRAFT ASSEMBLY LINES

NEW DELHI: The government has initiated the groundwork for local manufacturing of passenger aircraft, two officials aware of the development said, a move that could help India cut its reliance on importing Airbus and Boeing aircraft.

“The government is looking at sites near airports. The idea is to have enough land available near an airport so that there is runway access for test flights. The aviation ministry is expected to identify 5-6 such airports for this purpose,” one of the two officials said, requesting anonymity.

The civil aviation ministry has been tasked with identifying potential sites with adequate land as the facilities for aerospace manufacturing will need large space for assembly lines, aircraft parts, ancillary units and other storage requirements, the person added.

India can leverage its aircraft design and engineering capacity to realize its ambition to build commercial liners, reducing the country’s reliance on foreign suppliers. In September, China’s first locally designed and manufactured narrow-body aircraft cleared got a certificate from the Civil Aviation Administration of China to begin carrying passengers.

On 30 October, Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid the foundation stone of the C-295 transport aircraft manufacturing facility, the country’s first in the private sector, in Vadodara, Gujarat. The facility will manufacture C-295 aircraft for the Indian Air Force (IAF) through a collaboration between Tata Advanced Sytems Ltd and Airbus Defence and Space SA, Spain.