The Centre may be patting its back over the decision to privatise Delhi and Mumbai airports, but it has the Airports Authority of India (AAI) running for cover from leading international architects who were invited to submit design proposals for the two airports. The Government now says the final design will be decided by the private players when they come in.The decision to float global tenders inviting architectural designs for the two airports was consequent to an announcement in Finance Minister Jaswant Singh’s 2003 Budget speech. According to officials, it was decided that the Ministry of Civil Aviation will select the appropriate design for each airport. Those who were offloaded • Norman Foster - Chep Kok Lap Airport, Hong Kong • Kisho Kurokawa — Kuala Lumpur International Airport • Hellmuth Obata & Kassabaum — Fifth terminal at Heathrow • Arup Associaties — Fire safety work at Hong Kong Airport • Skidmore Owings & Merrill — famous Sears Towers, Chicago • Hochtief — Athens International Airport • Zurich Airports Authority • Lufthansa-Lehmer The design would be binding on the private player or consortium which would eventually be identified as a joint-venture partner. Based on this, global tenders were floated and by June, several leading architects from across the globe had shown interest on a promise that this time the Government was serious.These included big names like Norman Foster responsible for the design of Hong Kong airport, Kisho Kurokawa Associates who designed the Kuala Lumpur Airport and Zurich Airports Authority (see box).‘‘Look, we did not act on our own. The tenders were floated only after the Government agreed to do so. I really can’t say what the exact position on this matter is, but yes, we had finished the shortlisting way back in June and were awaiting further instructions from the Ministry,’’ says AAI Member (Planning & Operations) K Ramalingam.But the September 11-Cabinet approval on converting Delhi and Mumbai airports into joint-ventures makes it clear that the private firms will have to submit a concept design along with a time frame for its implementation. Senior Civil Aviation Ministry sources told The Indian Express that this makes the process gone through by AAI ‘‘redundant’’.AAI officials believe that this will lead to ‘‘credibility erosion’’ in the market, particularly when the participants had repeatedly sought clarification on Government backing.‘‘Now we will have to explain to them that the decision has changed. This will deifinitely affect our credibility, but that has been the case with airports privatisation for the past half-a-decade or so,’’ says an official. Stringent parameters had been set for architectural firms to even qualify. One of which was that each applicant ought to have designed the structure of a project worth $325 million in the last seven years. Ten applicants — five each for Mumbai and Delhi airports — were to be finally shortlisted for a design competition. Each shorlisted firm was to be paid Rs 3 lakh for just their participation while the winner would have got an award. At that point in time, AAI had calculated the project cost for Delhi as Rs 2,031 crore and Rs 1,864 crore for Mumbai in the first phase. These included elaborate plans like a mono-rail to connect terminals, parallel runways and revision of apron layout to accommodate more aircraft. The big question doing the rounds now is whether the joint-venture partner will be willing to undertake this kind of drastic renovation or not?‘‘We are hoping for the best. But one must not forget that the Bangalore airport, though a greenfield project, is a similar kind of joint-venture. But it hasn’t taken off yet,’’ reminds Ramalingam.
