It’s official: No airport at Chakan

The notification has asked the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) to start the land acquisition for it. The site for the proposed international airport, spread over six villages in Khed taluka of Pune district, has seen no progress in the last 10 years in terms of land acquisition.

Although the official notification of the land for the project was issued a decade ago, MIDC has failed to acquire any land in the region due to opposition from the villagers, who were also supported by Shiv Sena MP Shivajirao Adhalrao Patil. The erstwhile Congress-NCP government had accused the MP of playing politics with development.

The Airport Authority of India had identified two probable sites in the area. Ajit P Deshmukh, deputy collector and Regional Officer-1 of MIDC, said that the government’s notification reverting the usage of the land was received recently. “For the proposed international airport, the government had notified the land for the Airports Authority of India. But now, the government has reversed the notification and notified the land for industrial purposes,” he said.

The land to be acquired now would form part of Chakan V industrial estate, as per MIDC records. Over the years, Chakan’s MIDC area has become home to some of the big names of automobile industry. It is expected that the new MIDC area would accommodate more such players.

Growth of the city has made an international airport a necessity for it. With talks of Chinese and Japanese clusters coming up in Pune, the business community has been quick to point out that the present defence airport at Lohegaon would not be enough to cater to the need. Anant Sardeshmukh, director general of the Mahratta Chamber of Commerce Industries and Agriculture (MCCIA), said the city needed proper domestic connectivity as well as international connectivity. “Connectivity to Mumbai is also needed as there are no early morning flights from Pune. It makes sense to travel by road rather than take the existing flights,” he said.

Sardeshmukh said that other than the two sites in Khed, there were talks of an international airport either at Saswad or Pune-Solapur Road, but there has been no progress. “As an industry body, we had met the chief minister, the guardian minister and others regarding the airport. While all have agreed on the need for an international airport in Pune, we are yet to see any move on the ground,” he said.