Airports Authority Of India To Invest Rs 25,000 Crore For Expansion, Modification Of Existing Terminals: Govt

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has taken up a development programme to spend around Rs 25,000 crore in next five years for expansion and modification of existing terminals, new terminals, expansion or strengthening of existing runways, aprons, Airport Navigation Services (ANS), control towers, technical blocks etc, Union Minister of State in Civil Aviation Ministry General (Retired) V K Singh informed the Parliament on Monday (6 December).

He further informed that the government has accorded 'in-principle' approval for setting up of 21 greenfield airports across the country.

So far, eight Greenfield airports namely, Shirdi in Maharashtra, Durgapur in West Bengal, Pakyong in Sikkim, Kannur in Kerala, Orvakal in Andhra Pradesh, Kalaburagi in Karnataka, Sindhudurg in Maharashtra and Kushinagar in Uttar Pradesh have been operationalized, the minister said in reply to a question in Rajya Sabha.

"Three Public Private Partnership (PPP) airports at Delhi, Hyderabad and Bengaluru have undertaken major expansion plan to the tune of Rs 30,000 crore by 2025. Additionally, Rs 36,000 Crores have been planned for investment in the development of new Greenfield airports across the country under PPP mode," the minister said.

Under Regional Connectivity Scheme (RCS), also known as the Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik (UDAN) Scheme, as on 24 Nov 2021, 393 routes have commenced connecting 62 unserved and underserved airports, including two water aerodromes and six heliports, he said.

The Government has released over Rs 2,062 crore for revival of unserved and underserved airports/heliports/waterdrome of state government, PSUs and AAI etc since April 2017 to October 2021, he informed.