Keep HAL, Hyderabad airports open

Keep HAL, Hyderabad airports open
House Committee Asks Govt To Rework Deals With Developers
TIMES NEWS NETWORK


New Delhi: With the closure of existing Bangalore and Hyderabad airports only days ahead, a parliamentary committee has urged the government to let the facilities function along with the new airports in these cities.
While the new Hyderabad airport at Shamshabad (GMR Hyderabad International Airport Limited or GHIAL) is due to open on March 15, the inauguration of its Bangalore counterpart, the Bengaluru International Airport, at Devanahalli (Bangalore International Airport Limited or BIAL) is slated for March 28.
According to the jointventure agreements signed by both airport companies, the Centre has to ensure and notify that the older airports are not used for “commercial civil aviation operations” once the new ones become functional, although they can continue to provide “general aviation services” (excluding commercial flight and related services).
Committee chairman Sitaram Yechury, who presented the report to Parliament on Wednesday, said the panel had earlier made similar recommendations but the government did not accept them. “We want the government to rethink and renegotiate the agreements with the private parties involved. We hope the government will take the recommendations seriously this time. The government still has time to renegotiate the issue,” Yechury said.
The distance and poor accessibility to the Bengaluru International Airport has been worrying Bangaloreans. They want the HAL airport to continue operations as those taking short-haul flights can save time and expense.
The taxi fare to reach the new Hyderabad or Bangalore airports along with the user development fee “could cost a passenger more than a lowcost carrier’s ticket”, Yechury said, adding that the proposed fee should not be allowed to be implemented.
The parliamentary panel, comprising 10 Rajya Sabha and 31 Lok Sabha members, criticized the reported proposal to slap ‘user development fee’ of Rs 700 on every passenger who uses the new airports and called it “illogical and irrational”. A similar fee of Rs 300 per passenger at Ahmedabad and Trivandrum airports (undergoing expansion), which Airports Authority of India (AAI) had planned to impose, was turned down by the government.