Central Vigilance Commission sends plaint against award of 6 airports to MoCA

NEW DELHI: The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) has forwarded a complaint from a CPI (M) Rajya Sabha MP alleging irregularities in the decision to award six airports to the Adani group to the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA). The ministry is expected to look into the issue.

The letter by Elamaram Kareem alleges irregularities in the procedure followed during the award of the six AAI airports to Adani Enterprises. It says that ‘undue haste’ was shown by the government in this award. “It is evident from the records that the Ministry of Civil Aviation was in a spree to complete the transaction before 28.02.2019, rather than trying for getting a right price for our national Assets. It is worth to note that the same ministry granted extension of time to M/s Adani Enterprises from taking over of the Ahmedabad/Lucknow and Mangalore Airports for safeguarding the interest of private player during pandemic situation,” the letter says.

A detailed query on this and various other issues sent to the aviation ministry, AAI and the Adani Group did not elicit any response till the time of going to print. In February 2019, the government awarded six AAI airports - Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Jaipur, Guwahati, Thiruvananthapuram and Mangaluru – to Adani Enterprises to build and operate for a period of 50 years.


Of the six, takeover of Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Mangaluru airports by Adani has been delayed due to Covid and it has sought more time. The government also recently announced the start of handing over the remaining three airports to Adani by the middle of November. The final handover will however take some more time.

Kareem also complained about allowing companies with no minimum criteria to bid for the projects. The letter quotes from the model Request for Qualification document, which states that in case of no O&M qualification by the bidder it should be asked to make an arrangement to get into a pact with an experienced player.