Delhi airport to invest Rs. 9,000 cr to boost capacity.

Delhi airport plans to invest around Rs. 9,000 crore to boost its capacity, Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu said recently.

He was speaking at a function where he released two books — The Economic Impact Report of Delhi Airport and a coffee-table book on the Delhi airport.

The Delhi airport is operated by Delhi International Airport Ltd, a joint venture between GMR Group, Fraport and Airports Authority of India. It is the busiest airport in the country, handling close to 70 million passengers annually. The proposed upgrade will see the passenger handling capacity increase to over 90 million.

IP Prabhakara Rao, Executive Director, GMR Airports, told newspersons that the funds would be utilised over three years and would see the construction of a fourth runway which will have a length of 4 km. . Officials declined to get into the specifics of how the group planned to raise Rs. 9,000 crore but indicated that a large portion would be raised from outside. In the past, the airport recovered part of the funds that it had invested by imposing an arrival and depature tax. GMR officials declined to say whether the option of imposing an arrival and depature tax on passengers was being considered.

With this investment, the capex of Delhi airport will stand at around Rs. 22,000 crore, officials said.

“The biggest challenge will be to do upgrade work even as the airport operations continue at the airport,” Prabhakara Rao said.

Earlier, speaking at the launch function, GM Rao, Chairman, GMR Group, thanked the government for not exchanging any air services bilaterals with countries in the Gulf region as the move had helped Delhi airport become a hub airport.

Rao said that the Delhi airport was on track to replace London Heathrow and also Dubai as the busiest airport in the world.

HBL