Plans to privatise Chennai airport to be renewed? 

CHENNAI: Is Chennai Airport going to be privatised? Airports Authority of India (AAI) has conducted a study to find out the feasibility of privatising Chennai airport, according to a top AAI official.

The official told Express that the feasibility study was conducted six months ago, but he was unaware whether a decision to privatise the airport or not had been taken.“The feasibility study was conducted for airports that have a passenger movement of more than 15 lakh, but we have got nothing in black and white,” said the senior airport official.

This comes in the wake of reports that about 15 airports, including Chennai, could be put under private managements in the second such initiative.The AAI had plans to privatise the operation and maintenance of Chennai Airport in 2013 and  bids were called in 2014.

But they were withdrawn the next year. Sources indicated that since AAI completed a Rs 2,400-crore upgrade of Chennai and Kolkata airports, the then government citing the expensive upgrade did not go in for privatisation. Four of the six metro airports in the country, which include New Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru, are currently run by private operators.

Sources indicated that initially, AAI had decided to undertake Operation, Management and Development of the airport through a public-private partnership on Operate, Manage, Develop and Transfer basis. 

It floated bids on December 2014 calling for Request for Qualification. Representatives from Siemens Project Ventures GmbH, GVK Airport Holdings, GMR Airport Holdings, Egis Avia, Celebi Aviation, Tata Realty and Infrastructure Ltd, Pithavadian and Partners and Flemingo Intl Ltd expressed their interest.Chennai is the fourth busiest airport in the country with a traffic of nearly 15 million. Currently, the airport is implementing the phase II modernisation project at a estimated cost of Rs 2,500 crore.