New Delhi: The government has decided to privatize 15 airports of the country,including Lucknows Amausi airport.
The process will be kicked off with six major airports Kolkata,Chennai,Ahmedabad,Jaipur,Lucknow and Guwahati going for international bidding in the first phase.A meeting of an inter-ministerial group on this issue with representatives from the planning commission,finance,law and aviation ministries will be held on Thursday.
These airports will be operated,managed and further developed by the PPP players,in which Airports Authority of India will also have a stake, said a senior aviation ministry official.
Saurabh Sinha TNN
New operator will retain all airport staff
New Delhi: The aviation ministry says it has learnt from the experience of privatizing Delhi and Mumbai airports and wont be repeating some mistakes made then while privatizing 15 more airports.
All employees working at these airports will have to be retained by the new operators as the AAI will not have the capacity to absorb them, a senior aviation ministry official told TOI.Asked why the government is initiating this process with just a few months to go for the polls and when airport privatization has proven to be so controversial,the official said: The process is being started and we hope to put the blueprint in place.Maybe the process is actually taken forward by the next government but we are doing the groundwork.
The tariff for the entire concession period of 30 years (for which the airport will be given to PPP players) will be decided in one go and there will be price adjustment mechanisms to avoid multi-fold price escalation like those witnessed in Delhi and Mumbai.The cost escalation in Delhi has led to levy of such steep user charges that the place is now the most expensive airports for passengers and airlines globally.
The Comptroller and Auditor General had found several loopholes in the privatization agreement of Delhi Airport and alleged that the state had lost crores in revenue due to that.
Saurabh Sinha TNN
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