Proposal for second Chennai airport discussed, says AAI Chairman

The new additional domestic and international terminals at the Chennai airport are expected to be operational after two months, said V.P. Agrawal, Chairman, Airports Authority of India (AAI), here on Wednesday.

Speaking to the media after inaugurating the second international meeting of the Bay of Bengal, Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean Region, Mr. Agrawal said electricity to the new terminal buildings was energised only in the last week of March. Now, testing is in progress, which would last for two months. In that time, construction material in the terminal building would be removed and cleaning work would be completed. Then the new terminals would become operational, he said.vTalking about the new terminal, Mr. Agrawal said: “The new buildings are looking beautiful. They are excellent pieces of civil engineering.”

Answering a question on the second airport to Chennai, Mr. Agrawal said that on Tuesday evening, he had had a meeting with the Chief Secretary at which the issue of the second airport was discussed. The existing airport could suffice only for the next five years. Already, the AAI had given the proposal for a second airport at Sriperumbudur, he said. Land acquisition alone would cost Rs. 3,000 crore for the new airport. The AAI had proposed to spend another Rs. 4,000 crore for constructing terminals and other facilities. It could be operated in the private-public partnership mode, he said.

As far as the Madras Flying Club was concerned, the AAI could not allow the conducting of training classes in a metro airport of Chennai kind, where the number of flights has increased in the last few years. So the Club has to shift their operations to smaller airports such as Salem or Puducherry, he said.

When asked about the introduction of User Development Fee (UDF) for the new terminals at Chennai, Mr. Agrawal said the AAI had sent a proposal to the Airports Economic Regulatory Authority. “Only they will decide on the amount to be levied as UDF. The Authority had allowed a 350 per cent increase for Delhi International Airport, as it is a privately operated one,” Mr. Agrawal said.

Talking about the installation of in-line baggage scanning systems in the new terminals, Mr. Agrawal said the Bureau of Civil Aviation has reservations about the system. So the new buildings would have a stand-by scanning facility. The Chennai airport had achieved traffic growth of 17 per cent in the domestic sector and 12 per cent in the international sector, Mr. Agrawal added.