Wait for new airport terminal in Mohali continues

Speaking to Newsline, Suneel Dutt, chief executive officer, Chandigarh International Airport, said the construction of the terminal building has been completed, but flight services cannot be availed by public immediately.

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“The land for setting up aviation turbine fuel tanks that has been allotted to Indian Oil, Hindustan Petroleum and Bharat Petroleum is not completed. The deployment of the Central Industrial Security Force at the airport awaits formal sanction from the Centre. Also, the formal handing-over of the terminal Larsen & Toubro (the company which has constructed the terminal) to Airport Authority of India will take a few days as they are conducting final trial runs of the airport,” Dutt said.

He added that these issues will take at least another three weeks for completion and consequently, the airport can then be fully operational upon their completion.

Dutt though had earlier stated in an interview to Newsline that, “Depending on the Prime Ministe’’s schedule, the airport will be inaugurated and thrown to public. Otherwise everything is in order”.

According to sources in the ministry of civil aviation it is unlikely that the new terminal will be inaugurated until mid-August owing to the scheduled commitments of the Prime Minister.

When asked Dutt declined to comment about the future or tentative date for inauguration.

At present, the first phase of the terminal has been constructed. It has a capacity of accommodating 1,600 passengers at a time and a parking space for 500 vehicles. Six escalators, 48 check-in counters, 14 lifts and three aero-bridges have also been constructed at a total cost of over Rs 475 crore.

The wait for the building of the new terminal and subsequent plying of international flights has been long awaited. As reported earlier, the new airport terminal that is scheduled to start service cannot be put to full use since it is being hampered by many factors.

ILS Cat-II is being installed at the Chandigarh Airport and implemented alongside runway resurfacing. Further, the runway is being strengthened and will expand up to 10,400 metres. In a statement issued by the ministry of defence in December, the work on upgrading the necessary facilities will be completed by January 2017. Until then wide-bodied aircraft will not be able to ply on the local runway.