By Arshad Khan Cochin International Airport Ltd (CIAL) has said it has awarded the mechanical, electrical, and public health system contract for its new international terminal to Sterling and Wilson, a part of the Shapoorji Pallonji Group. "We are extremely happy that Sterling and Wilson has been entrusted with the opportunity of providing MEP solutions for Cochin International Airport's New International Terminal. Having already successfully completed the electrical installations for Terminal 3- Indira Gandhi International Airport, we are confident that our astute technical knowledge and in-depth resources will ensure that the New Terminal at Cochin International Airport will have a world class feel about it," said Prassana Sarambale, group vice-president business development, Sterling and Wilson Ltd. The new international terminal at CIAL will spread across a built up area of 1.5 million square feet. Sterling and Wilson's scope of work under this contract will include complete electrical installations, air-conditioning, fire protection, building management systems, plumbing management systems, vertical and horizontal transportation system, along with operation and maintenance work. The project is expected to be completed within a period of 18 months. CIAL is also the first green field airport in the country built with Public-Private Partnership and is ranked as the fourth largest international airport in India in terms of passenger traffic. Sterling and Wilson will also assume responsibility of providing complete operation and maintenance work after the commissioning of the new international terminal.
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Ashish SinhaExploiting the underutilised bilaterals and taking advantage of the open sky for the SAARC nations can give a fillip to the tourism sector in India, said the Civil Aviation minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju on Thursday (23 July). Sending out a strong message to Indian carriers, the civil aviation minister said domestic airlines, both public and private ones, need to "pull up their socks" with regard to utilisation of bilaterals. "As far as I know, India has lot of unused bilaterals and so just Indian players need to pull up their socks... Of course, foreign carriers are going to ask for more bilaterals," Raju said. A bilateral transport pact or air services agreement, allows flight services between two countries. "A solution is that Indian players start using Indian bilaterals... Almost all the private airlines are also sitting on bilaterals. So, I guess this problem has to be addressed," Raju said. The Minister said he has been requesting airlines to use the bilaterals because if they don't, then India loses out. Raju said that tourism sector needed the Central and State governments to work in harmony with the private sector. He urged the industry to share an actionable paper with his Ministry to take forward the agenda of promoting the sector. The civil aviation minister was speaking at a tourism conference organised by FICCI in partnership with the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India and Tourism Finance Corporation of India (TFCI). Speaking on the occasion, Dr Mahesh Sharma, the minister of State (IC), Tourism ministry said that the highest priority should be accorded to improving India’s perception abroad. As a country, India must be looked at as a congenial and conducive environment by foreign tourists. He added that it was imperative for citizens to cherish the country’s heritage and communicate its richness to visitors. Sharma said that for tourism to thrive it was essential that infrastructure development and regional connectivity went hand-in-hand. Ministries and States need to come on-board for this and issues related to the sector must be resolved within a stipulated timeframe in a single window approach, he added. Speaking on medical tourism, Dr. Sharma said that India has lagged behind in medical tourism despite its competitive pricing of health care delivery. For instance, a heart surgery may cost a person in Europe around Rs. 15-20 lakh but in India the same would cost approximately Rs. 2 lakh. Yet, we have not been able to realize the true potential as the sector remains unorganized, he added. To promote tourist destinations, Dr. Sharma proposed that visual presentations and interactive audio-visual media should be employed to make the experience of visitors to heritage sites and monuments lively and engrossing. He added that social interaction needs to be revived to showcase India’s heritage on the global platform. Dr Jyotsna Suri, President, FICCI, said that foreign tourist arrivals in India in 2014 was 7.7 million with a foreign exchange earning of Rs. 120083 crore. Indian tourism grew at 10.6% while the world tourism at 4.4%. With this projected growth, the country witnesses a void as the infrastructure struggles to cope with the demand in tourism. She added that TIM has been conceptualized with the aim to bridge this gap by bringing together the policy makers and investors on the same platform.
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Despite a healthy increase in revenue from the four airports – Chennai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad and Jaipur – and fearing a start of any fresh protest from airport employee unions, the central government is in no mood to privatise them. Instead, the Civil Aviation Ministry has initiated the process of developing these four airports through public private partnership model, which is moving at a very slow pace, says a senior ministry official. For the record, Minister of State for Civil Aviation Mahesh Sharma has said: "There is no proposal of privatisation of these airports at present." Sharma informed the upper house of Parliament on the first day of the Monsoon session via a written reply. But according to the revenue figures submitted by the ministry, the Chennai airport has generated an average of 21 per cent increase in its revenue from the airports operation in the past two years. For 2013-14, Chennai airport clocked a revenue of Rs 908.32 crore, a jump of 31 per cent over the previous year. For 2014-15 (revised estimates), the airport revenue from Chennai stood at Rs 1,022.80 crore thereby showing a 12 per cent increase over FY13. Similarly, Kolkata airport clocked a revenue of Rs 670 crore for FY15 and Rs 630 crore for FY14. Even the airports of Ahmedabad and Jaipur have reported an increase in their respective revenue for the last two financial years. But the civil aviation ministry has already floated the Request for Qualification (RFQ) for these airports. When specifically asked whether the Airports Authority of India has opposed privatisation, the minister replied in the negative. But only three months ago, the unions at Kolkata airport had threatened to bring all operations to a standstill. The protest was against any move to privatise the Kolkata airport. When the UPA-I government had attempted to privatise the Kolkata airport on similar lines as the Delhi, Hyderabad and the Bangalore airport, the union had blocked the normal operations at the Kolkata airport. Under the Left Front government rule in West Bengal, the then civil aviation minister Praful Patel was forced to abandon plans for the privatisation of both Kolkata and Chennai airports. Instead, the ministry had conceded to allow the Airports Authority of India to redevelop these two airports.
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Opposing the government's airports privatisation plan, Airports Authority Employees Union (AAEU) has threatened to renew its agitation including a strike call if the move is not halted. The AAEU, in a letter to Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju recently, has also alleged that the decision to privatise the development, operations and management of four more airports - Chennai, Kolkata, Jaipur and Ahmedabad - violates the Tripartite Committee recommendations, which have already been accepted by the government long back. "If the government does not give us a proper hearing, we shall be constrained to take to recourse to industrial action and call for a general strike in AAI (Airports Authority of India)," the union said. The decision is detrimental to the interests of not only AAI employees but also air travelling public, it said. "The services provided at private airports come at a high price, as has been experienced with all the existing private airports where costs borne by the air travelers are much higher in comparison to the AAI-managed airports, where quality service is equally available at a much cheaper price," the union said. The fresh agitation threat by the AAI employees comes following the NDA government taking a U-turn on the airport privatisation policy. The erstwhile UPA government had proposed to privatise six airports - Chennai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Lucknow and Guwahati. In 2013, it had floated a global tender to give management contract for these airports. However, the move did not take off as the then government went into election mode. Taking the previous government agenda forward despite a stiff opposition from the AAI union, the new government had said it would privatise only Ahmedabad and Jaipur airports and not hand over Chennai and Kolkata airports to the private corporates as it has already invested public money to the tune of Rs around 5,000 crore in their modernisation and upgrade. The government, however, in a departure from earlier stand, early this month invited private domestic and overseas firms to operate, manage and develop the Chennai, Kolkata, Jaipur and Ahmedabad airports. But it left out Guwahati and Lucknow airports from the agenda as besides loss-making these airports also do not have enough volumes to attract private players. Even in the draft aviation policy announced last year, the government had stated that management contracts will be issued for the Kolkata and Chennai airports and the privatisation of Guwahati and Lucknow airports has been put on hold. Government's airport privatisation policy also came under criticism recently by the global airlines body, International Air Transport Association (IATA), which has often termed Indian airports as one of the most "expensive" ones. Observing that privatisation is not a "panacea" and does not solve all the problems, IATA Director general and chief executive Tony Tyler had said, "There are very successful airports run by Governments and private companies, while there are very expensive and inefficient airports too run by governments and private sector." (PTI)
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Fliers travelling with gold and precious jewellery may soon have some relief as Customs is mulling opening a counter at Delhi Airport for appraisal of such expensive items before embarking on a foreign travel so that they are not charged duty on their return. Giving away the earlier practice where a flier had to get their gold and jewellery evaluated at the Gems and Jewellery appraisal counter in Central Delhi, Customs has intensified its negotiations with the Delhi International Airport Limited, operator of Indira Gandhi International Airport here, official sources said. The Customs, which had been making attempts for having such counter for last one year, got into fast track after Delhi High Court recently directed it to take a reasoned decision within six months on shifting the existing appraisal counter to the airport or in the close vicinity. At present, an international flier has to travel about 30 kms from the airport to appraisals counters at Jhandewalan area in the national capital to declare gold and other expensive jewelleries and take an export certificate. The certificate can be shown to customs officials upon their return to avoid payment of duty on such items declared by them. There are already counters at the airport to declare personal items like watches, sun glasses and others being taken by fliers and airline crew. The High Court has asked Customs to have an additional counter inside or near the airport in case the appraisal counter cannot be shifted. A public interest litigation was filed in the court on the non-availability of appraisal counters inside the airport. "No appraisal counter which can give export certificate is available at IGI Airport and for getting the assessment; passengers are directed to Customs House at Jhandewalan, which is 30 kms distance -- the same causes inconvenience to the passengers," the petition said. Responding to the petition, Customs has contended that the process of issuing of export certificate for gold jewellery is time consuming, wherein the metal is tested for its purity rank and photographs are taken and the jewellery sealed. The department, opposing the PIL, contended that since export certificate can be issued only in advance, relocating such services to airport will require the passengers to make two trips to airport, furthering the problems faced by them. "Such trips with jewellery may also cause security hazards for the passengers," it said, adding that the IGI airport Customs is short of desirable space and infrastructure and trained jewellery appraisers to provide such facilities there. Rejecting the Customs counter-affidavit in this regard, the Court in its order given on Monday said if the appraisal counters are at the airport or in its close vicinity then "such persons can advance their departure from their homes by an hour or so, to in the same visit, obtain the export certificate as well as board the flight". "Internationalisation of the airports in the country has to be not only for looks but also in terms of convenience and amenities, facilities and following the practices in vogue at the airports of other countries," the court said, disposing off the petition. (PTI)
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Eight non-metro airports modernised using public money have no scheduled flights operating there, leading them to incur a total loss of about Rs 82 crore in the last three years. As the Indian government pushes for air connectivity in remote areas, official figures show that these eight airports have jointly incurred a total loss of over Rs 25 crore in 2011-12, over 27 crore in 2012-13 and almost Rs 30 crore in 2013-14, official sources said. Reacting sharply to the "precarious" situation prevailing at these airports, aviation industry experts said only market conditions and operational viability and "not political compulsions" should determine developing airports or creating new ones. The airports, which were modernised and upgraded by state-run Airports Authority of India (AAI) but have no scheduled flights, are at Akola (Maharashtra), Bikaner and Jaisalmer (Rajasthan), Coochbehar (West Bengal), Cuddapah (Andhra Pradesh), Pathankot and Ludhiana (Punjab) and Puducherry. Details regarding the cost of modernising these airports were not immediately available. Similarly, the figures on losses of Bhatinda and Jalgaon airports, also modernised by AAI with no scheduled flights operating from there, were also not available. Asked why airlines were not flying to these places, official sources said it was up to the airline operators to provide air services to such places "depending on the traffic demand and commercial viability", apart from the route dispersal guidelines. Airlines Not ConsultedHowever, industry experts disagreed saying airlines should be consulted first before investments are made for developing airports. "It is a precarious situation. Airports should not be developed merely because of political compulsions, but only on the basis of operational feasibility and market conditions. Airports do not just mean plush terminal buildings like shopping malls. The apron and the runway are crucial for flight operations," said Debashis Saha, senior executive of the professional aviation body Aeronautical Society of India. Therefore, detailed feasibility studies for short, medium and long term flight operations should be carried out, both for passenger and cargo operations, "before any decision is taken to upgrade an airport or create a new one," he said. Giving examples of other countries, he said airport operators like Changi in Singapore "attract airlines by offering special schemes including no or low charges and marketing budget". "Government should make available some funds to attract airlines to Tier-II and III cities at least for three years so as to enable airlines to achieve market capitalisation and help air traffic in these sectors grow," Saha said. Airlines should be consulted and asked to study the market potential of an airport in a remote or a non-metro city so that they can sustain day-to-day operations, Saha said, adding the airlines should also be asked to commit to launch operations if found viable. Cost of day-to-day operations include those for maintenance of all technical equipment, the terminal, payment for staff, location of fire and security services. Saha said the costs incurred in these areas have led to the eight airports to run into losses without having even a single scheduled flight. Though AAI was providing incentives like no landing or parking charges and priority of slots to flights between Tier -II and Tier-III cities, he said unless the airlines were consulted beforehand, these incentives would not work and "the AAI would continue to incur heavy losses". (PTI)
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