Destination Unknown

The state government is heading for a clear crisis as far as its air services are concerned. Its airports are bulging at the seams and the international terminal in Mumbai, apart from being the busiest airport in the country, is rapidly running out of space. More worrying, the state government is not even close to finding a solution to these problems.

Take the case of finding new space for the state's international travellers. In June 1995, state Chief Minister Manohar Joshi signed a deal with a British consortium, represented by the Hindujas, for a second airport. Sicom, the state's key investment agency, was to conduct a pre-feasibility study for this. Although the deal with Sicom is still on, the state is in a dilemma because the Shiv-Sena supremo, Bal Thackery, had criticised the project after it was announced in London, saying that there were other important issues which required immediate attention.

 

The present airport caters to a traffic of about 11 million passengers every year and studies show that by 2005, when the traffic is expected to swell to 23.5 million, this airport will not be equipped to handle the traffic.

Sicom's pre-feasibility study shows that setting up a new airport will cost nearly $ 3.6 billion. P D Karandikar, managing director of Sicom, says, Earlier it was decided to locate the airport near Mumbai, but now alternative locations like Pune, Nagpur and Goa are being examined and would be finalised in the next six months. According to him, there is no controversy over the deal and the deal with the British consortium is still open. Until the project is commissioned, however, there is no saying whether Thackeray will raise a ruckus or not.

Another surprising development has been the floating of a new airline by the state government especially at a time when most private airlines are struggling to stay afloat. For connecting other growth centres in state,- #include virtual="/incs/bottom.inc"-->