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Bangalore, May 16 Bangalore City Connect Foundation, a group of prominent citizens and businesspersons which is fighting against the closure of the HAL airport in the city, has said the May 12 “re-negotiations” that Central and State Government officials held with the operator of the new airport, BIAL, were neither genuine, transparent nor in public interest.

Its members said closing down an existing infrastructure for private commercial interest was hasty and unrealistic.

The May 12 meeting was held at the court’s directive. The group has organised a silent demonstration at the HAL airport on Saturday evening.

The Bengaluru International Airport, built for 12 million passengers a year against the current traffic of 10.5 million, would throw up a serious capacity crisis in two years, they argued. Biocon’s CEO and Connect member Ms Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, said, “It is vital to keep the HAL airport. We believe the concession agreement (CA) is flawed. It was based on the circumstances and growth projections of that time (2004). Today, there is a radical shift in these circumstances and so there is a need to review the CA,” she said.

Mr V. Ravichandar of market research agency Feedback Ventures said, “In our view, genuine re-negotiation has not happened (on May 12). BIA also opens on May 23, when the High court is on vacation until May 26 and in the absence of an elected State Government.”

City Connect has repeatedly aired these concerns to the Ministry of Civil Aviation but has been ignored. It has been denied the minutes of the May 12 talks, said Mr Devesh Agarwal and former State Chief Secretary, Dr A. Ravindra.

The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) has taken charge of the security at the Bengaluru International Airport at Devanahalli preparatory to its opening.

Airport operator BIAL on Friday said 770 CISF personnel would be initially deployed on the airport site and increased to 1,039 once they assumed land-side responsibilities also. The charge was handed over to the CISF Commandant, Mr Digvijay Kumar Singh, in a ceremony earlier this week.

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