Purandar International airport gets defence ministry nod

Land acquisition process to begin soon for the proposed international airport near Pune

Representational Pic

The Purandar Airport project is all set to take off. The Maharashtra Airport Development Company (MADC) has received the much-awaited clearance from the Ministry of Defence and the Airports Authority of India (AAI) for the proposed international airport at Purandar taluka, which is more than 30 km from Pune city

In 2016, CM Devendra Fadnavis had announced that the new airport project would be named after Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj. According to sources, work on the project was slow as necessary permissions from the defence ministry were pending for over three months.

Speaking to mid-day, an MADC official said, "A few months ago, the Indian Air Force (IAF) had sought some more information from the AAI about the proposed airport and, in our last meeting, we cleared their doubts. We have received the clearance to go ahead with the project now. There was a contention over the fact that a portion of the flight path of the Purandar airport intersects the safe zone of the Lohegaon airfield. A solution is being worked out with the ministry to address this issue, at the earliest. If an IAF aircraft takes off from the Jamnagar base for the Goa airfield, and in cases of emergencies, the flight may be diverted to Lohegaon. Therefore, the flight path has to be clear of any intersection. The authorities want to ensure that air space is made available to the IAF on priority basis in cases of emergencies."

A German company, which had prepared a detailed project report (DPR) and developed airports in cities like Berlin, Munich, Kuwait and Frankfurt, had been given the contract for the Pune project in March last year. According to MADCâu00c2u0080u00c2u0088sources, the land acquis­ition process for the project is expected to begin soon.

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