Slow takeoff for two greenfield int’l airports
NAVI MUMBAI, PUNE With projects mired in land disputes, villagers refusing to vacate plots, work on two proposed airports moves at a snail’s pace
If everything goes as per the Maharashtra government’s plans, 2021 could be a landmark year for aviation with two new airports in Mumbai and Pune opening to the public. However, with both projects facing resistance from villagers who must vacate land, the ground reality is that the government needs to immediately solve the deadlock between those affected by the project and the state authorities if the 2021 deadline is to be met.
Mumbai and Pune’s airports have reached saturation points with Pune International Airport handling 8.16 million passengers in 2017-18, and Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport crossing its maximum passenger-handling capacity of 45 million in March. Years have been spent planning these projects and identifying the land.
After at least two proposed sites for Pune’s second airport were rejected over the past decade, Purandar was approved by the Airports Authority of India in 2016 and received clearance from the defence ministry – the site is close to a military airport – on January 23, 2018.
The new airport will have two runways and will handle both passenger and cargo traffic. On May 9, the project was approved by the national steering committee appointed to clear greenfield airports (aviation facilities built from scratch on undeveloped land). Maharashtra Airport Development Corporation has appointed Changi Airports International, a leading consultant, for peer review, which should be completed by the year-end. Mumbai’s new airport is to be built in Navi Mumbai and aims to be one of the world’s largest greenfield airports with two parallel runways of 3,700 metres and the capacity to handle 10 million passengers a year.
Land from 10 villages is needed for this project and so far, 1,100 families have vacated their plots so that the area can be levelled to lay out the airport.
The government claims both these projects have the consent of villagers and are progressing as per schedule, but when HT visited the affected villages, it found disgruntled locals. In Navi Mumbai, evacuated families have had to rent homes because the resettlement colonies in Pushpak and Ulwe are not yet ready. Those who haven’t vacated their land are refusing to move out. “There is no water and electricity supply in the area. Why would we leave our ancestral homes where we have all the basic facilities and shift to a place which is going to be trouble for us?” said Kanchan Gharat, sarpanch of Varcha Owle village.
The opposition to the new Pune airport is even more intense. On August 6, approximately 10,000 people, from the seven villages that need to be vacated, held a rasta roko.
“We are not going to give up on our land at any cost. The government is talking about our land and our villages to the world, but nothing is being told to us,” said Jitendra Memane, former sarpanch of Pargaon, one of the villages to be vacated.
Dhiraj Mathur, an expert on aerospace and defence, and currently a partner with Pricewaterhouse Coopers, said, “Authorities should speed up the land acquisition process in order to meet the new deadline (of 2021). There could be various issues that authorities are facing, but the process of acquiring land needs to be completed.”
MUMBAI:
Panvel Creek AREA hectares PROJECT COST crore Seawoods Belapur CBD
Location: Ulwe, Raigad district, 40 kms from Mumbai Promoters: GVK Power & Infrastructure, City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) Taloje Creek
NAVI MUMBAI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT (PROPOSED SITE) Capacity: 20 million passengers per year (first phase), there will be subsequent additions in later phases
No of villages/people affected: Ten villages/ families Deadline: Chief minister, Devendra Fadnavis had announced that the first flight would take off from NMIA by the end of 2019. Aviation ministry has now said that flights will start in September 2021. crore Kasurdi
Location: Purandar taluka, 45 kms from Pune Promoters: Maharashtra Airport Development Corporation (owned by Maharashtra government) Capacity: 75 million passengers per year (all phases) No of villages/families that will have to be relocated: Seven villages/
families
Deadline: No clear deadline
EVACUATED FAMILIES IN NAVI MUMBAI HAVE HAD TO RENT HOMES AS THE RESETTLEMENT COLONIES ARE NOT YET READY; THOSE STILL THERE ARE REFUSING TO MOVE OUT