Delhi International Airport Ltd (DIAL), the joint-venture company which is tasked with the modernising and restructuring of the Delhi airport, is apparently not amused at the rush being shown by the Government. Having secured clearances from all ministries concerned, the Civil Aviation Ministry is awaiting comments from the Finance Ministry before moving the Cabinet. The proposed site at Jewar in Greater Noida is roughly 72 km away from Delhi and 120 kilometres from Agra. The project is estimated to cost around Rs 3,505 crore.

The Airports Authority of India (AAI), which is likely to hold 13 per cent equity in the project, has already given its go-ahead to the proposal. “Operationally, there is no problem with the project. Airspace spread over 60 nautical miles will be controlled by a Tower Control set up at Jewar while airspace outside this range would continue to be controlled by the ATC at IGI airport,” a senior AAI official told The Indian Express. What this essentially means is that the ATC at Jewar would only control aircraft during take-offs and landings. “Around 5,000 acres have already been identified and an airport with a single runway and terminal capacity of 40 million passengers per annum can be set up to start with,” the official said.

Declining to comment directly on the idea of having a greenfield airport so close to Delhi, DIAL’s spokesperson Arun Arora said the GMR group would certainly participate in the bidding for the Greater Noida airport when it happens. DIAL has the right of first refusal in the proposed project. This means that in case DIAL’s bid is within 10 per cent of the best bid made, they will get a chance to match it.

“The masterplan we submitted to the Government takes care of potential traffic till the year 2030. The capacity we will build will always be ahead of the demand and we would be able to cater to 100 million passengers by 2026,” Arora said. Senior DIAL officials, requesting anonymity, said the new airport, if commissioned before exhausting the proposed capacity at Delhi, would be disastrous.

Despite the Civil Aviation Ministry’s Policy on Airport Infrastructure (1997), which states that no greenfield airport will normally be allowed within an aerial distance of 150 km of an existing airport, the Jewar airport appears on track.

In fact, the Government has also cleared a greenfield airport at Navi Mumbai despite the fact that it falls within 150-km aerial distance of the existing Mumbai airport. The Ministry is now planning a techno-feasibility study and a detailed simulation study by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) on the project.

The ICAO study, as was done for Navi Mumbai, is imperative to ascertain whether a conflict-free operation of an airport at the proposed location would be feasible alongwith the Indira Gandhi International Airport at Delhi.