The Secretary of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Rajiv Bansal on Tuesday said that the construction of the Noida International Airport and Navi Mumbai Airports is on track and the two are likely to be inaugurated by next year.
Speaking at CAPA India Aviation Summit, Bansal said that they are looking at a 500 million capacity at six metro airports taken together. “The six major metro airports in India that include Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai, and Hyderabad together currently have a passenger handling capacity of 320 million,” Bansal said.
The civil aviation secretary also said that Delhi’s terminal one (T1) expansion work will be completed by August- September this year.
“We hope that terminal 1 will get expanded and the three terminals at Delhi airport collectively will have a capacity of handling of 100 million passengers per year,” Bansal said.
The fourth runway will get operational by August by which the air traffic movements correspondingly would increase, he said.
He said that Air India’s privatisation provides a level-playing field for other carriers and there is excellent scope for international connectivity growth, given India has a large diaspora of 30 million.
“India is allowing Foreign Aircrew Temporary Authorization (FATA) pilots for 777s because there is demand but no skilled competency available,” he said.
In view of the huge demand for international and domestic travel, the challenge will be building world-class infrastructure, he added.
He also said that there is a need for 19-seater aircraft exists in India now to connect tier 3 and 4 cities. He appreciated the UDAN scheme and called it unparalleled.
He also said that Air India Engineering Services Ltd’s (AIESL) investment plans are in the advanced stages.