The Hindu Business Line : Make Bangalore airport bigger, promoters told

New Delhi, July 11 The Ministry of Civil Aviation has written to the promoters of the new airport in Bangalore pointing out that the project has to become bigger in size so as to handle the growing volume of passenger traffic.

A senior Government official told newspersons that the promoters of the new airport have been asked to create temporary capacity to look after the immediate passenger needs and also work on creating a “mirror image” of the existing passenger terminal to ensure that the handling capacity of the airport increases to meet future demand.

“The airport has been asked to create a mirror image of the existing terminal within the next three years. The size of the Bangalore airport has to be bigger,” the official added.

The project, which is being undertaken by a consortium that includes Siemens-Zurich Airport, L&T, Airports Authority of India (AAI) and Karnataka State Investment and Industrial Development Corporation began operations on May 24 this year.

bailout package for Air India

A Ministry official said that the issue of a liberal financial bailout package for Air India was discussed at the meeting that the Minister for Civil Aviation, Mr Praful Patel, had with the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, recently.

Meanwhile, the Ministry has no plans to restrict or stop issuing Non-Scheduled Operating Permits (NSOP) to companies for importing aircraft for operating non-scheduled flights despite there being cases of alleged duty evasion by some companies.

Norms eased

The Government had recently liberalised the NSOP norms, thereby allowing import of aircraft through this route after paying a marginal import duty as compared to what had to be paid earlier. In the recent past, the Customs department has sent notices and seized the aircraft of some companies, alleging evasion of duty.

“It is important to build the NSOP sector of aviation. The aircraft are not only used by some individuals but are also used to operate non-scheduled flights to places which help promote religious and other types of tourism.

“If there have been some aberrations, then it should be tackled by a different department. We are promoting a bigger concept,” Mr Patel said.

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