PATNA: The Airports Authority of India (AAI) will in May start the construction of a boundary wall over the 108 acres of land earmarked for a new terminal building at the Bihta airbase.
Sources said the Patna district administration is likely to hand over the land transfer documents to the AAI in a couple of days. “The documents are ready,” Patna DM Kumar Ravi said on Friday.
According to Patna district additional land acquisition officer Shiv Ranjan, the state government has acquired 126.4acre land at Bihta. “The government has paid Rs 130 crore. The remaining 18 acre will be used for the civil enclave, including a guesthouse and a hangar,” he said and added the length of the existing runway at Bihta airbase was 9,000ft and the AAI proposed to extend it further so as to operate commercial flights from it.
Patna’s Jayaprakash Narayan International (JPNI) airport director Rajendra Singh Lahauria said the construction of boundary wall around the land earmarked for the new terminal building at Bihta would begin by May.
“The work on the new terminal building at Bihta airbase will begin by next year,” he said and added their priority for now was the extension work at the Patna airport where a new terminal building would be readied by 2021.
The Bihta airport will function in tandem with the existing JPNI airport in the heart of the state capital. Patna will thus have two operational airports within a distance of 30km.
Sources said while bigger aircraft and probably international flights were likely to be operated from the Bihta airbase, domestic flights involving small aircraft would operate from the Patna airport.
The National Highways Authority of India is simultaneously working on a plan to develop a four-lane semi-elevated expressway between the Danapur railway station and the Bihta airbase.
