The Hindu Business Line : Greenfield airport policy referred to three-member group

The group includes the Finance Minister, Mr P. Chidambaram; the Minister for Civil Aviation, Mr Praful Patel; and the Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia.

Our Bureau

New Delhi, Nov. 2 The Committee on Infrastructure (CoI) has referred the policy on greenfield airports to a three-member Government Committee after differences arose among Cabinet Ministers on the existing policy.

Official sources told Business Line that while one Cabinet Minister was against the present policy of not allowing another airport to come up within a 150 km radius of an existing airport, another Minister questioned the wisdom of asking the promoters of such airports to seek all clearances themselves before approaching the Centre for its nod.

The CoI is headed by the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh.

Final Nod

The three-member Committee set up on Thursday include the Union Finance Minister, Mr P. Chidambaram; the Minister for Civil Aviation, Mr Praful Patel; and the Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia.

The Committee would have another look at all aspects and report back to the Union Cabinet which would give the final nod for the new greenfield airport policy, a senior Government official said. No time frame, however, has been set for the Committee to report back to the Union Cabinet. Last month, an Inter-Ministerial Group (IMG) set up to recommend principles, guidelines and licensing conditions for greenfield airports had recommended that mandatory approvals for such airports would not be required except for in special cases. The IMG included senior officials of various Ministries including Civil Aviation, Finance and Commerce among others. The IMG had suggested that if a greenfield airport was to come up within a 150 km radius of an existing airport or the proposed airport would be in a defence airfield then it would still need to be cleared by the Centre. Otherwise the promoter could approach the Ministry of Civil Aviation and the greenfield airport would be operational after the Directorate General of Civil Aviation gives the licence.