HYDERABAD: Sending hopes of people living in the districts of Telangana soaring, the Roads and Buildings (R&B) Department has sought details of High Flood Levels (HFL) for six airports proposed across the State as sought by the Airport Authority of India, New Delhi.
The six airports proposed are at Warangal, Adilabad, Jakranpally (Nizamabad), Bhadradri-Kothagudem, Basanth Nagar (Ramagundam) and Devarkadra (Mahbubnagar). The R&B Department has asked Superintending Engineers in the six districts to furnish the details of HFLs on an urgent basis.
Though the Union Cabinet on Wednesday announced that Jaipur, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram airports will be leased out to private players in a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model, no mention was made of the six proposed airports in Telangana for which the State government had reached out to AAI last year.
State officials claimed that these proposed airports will qualify for private sector participation when their commercial viability improves.
Speaking to Express, Principal Secretary Jayesh Ranjan, said, “The AAI will be conducting a survey to assess the feasibility of constructing these six proposed airports. The feasibility will be assessed both infrastructure-wise and on commercial returns.”
Ranjan added, “Handing them over to a private party will only happen once these airports establish commercial viability. Telangana will therefore not qualify for private sector participation at this point in time.”
In a bid to improve air connectivity, last year the TS government had sought help from AAI to build three brownfield and three greenfield airports across the State. Infrastructure developer GMR which, through a joint venture, operates the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA) had indicated that they would operate the Warangal airport soon.
Earlier in March, AAI Chairman Arvind Singh said that under the proposal that is being discussed, Telangana government will build the infrastructure for the airport in Warangal and GMR will get to operate it for 10 years. After 10 years, the property will revert to AAI.
Warangal’s Superintendent Engineer, Nagendar Rao, said, “An external consultancy has been approved to conduct this survey. We have to send in the numbers regarding the viability of the site itself to AAI, including HF levels. However, as per my knowledge, the site for proposed Warangal airport does not have any issues as of yet.”