Babu: Kannur Airport to be Operational by Next May.

Kannur International Airport will be operational on commercial basis from May 2016, Excise Minister K Babu said recently.

He was presiding the fifth annual general body meeting of the share holders. 'On experimental basis, the first plane will land in the airport on December 31, this year,' he said.

An MoU has been signed with Airport Authority of India for investment worth Rs. 100 crore in this regard. 'Rs. 50 crore has already been received. We expect the rest soon,' the minister said.

The minister informed that 57 per cent of the runway work of the airport has been completed. 'Besides 36 per cent of the passenger terminal building has already been completed.

For the CNS/ATM service for the international airport, another MoU has been signed with Airport Authority of India and permissions to build the airport have been garnered from them,' he pointed out.

KITCO Ltd. has been appointed as the consultant engineer firm for the item rate contract activities. A share worth Rs. 10 crore has been given to the Canara Bank and a share of Rs. 25 crore to M A Yusuf Ali and share of Rs. 170 crore to Bharat Petroleum has been alloted.

'Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. has also agreed to an additional investment of Rs. 46.80 crore. For loan amounting to Rs. 892 crore for the project, an agreement has been signed with a consortium including Canara bank, Federal bank and South Indian bank,' the minister explained.

So far 612 acres of land has been acquired out of 753 acres required.

Chief secretary and Kannur International Airport Company Ltd. Director Jiji Thomson, Managing Director G Chandra Mouli and company secretary Aneesh Kurian also attended the event.


THE NEW INDIAN EXPRESS