E-Paper
Bids for Ambala airport terminal to open on July 20
To take up flight operations from the airport using Indian Air Force (IAF) strip, the Haryana Public Works Department (PWD) is all set to invite bids for the renovation of an abandoned building to be used as terminal
: Days after the union government sanctioned 20 acres of defence land for the construction of civil enclave (domestic airport) in Ambala Cantonment, the tender for the ₹16.6 crore airport terminal will open on July 20.
To take up flight operations from the airport using Indian Air Force (IAF) strip, the Haryana Public Works Department (PWD) is all set to invite bids for the renovation of an abandoned building to be used as terminal.
Ambala deputy commissioner Shaleen on Friday told HT that the Haryana government will pay ₹133 crore for the defence land to the union government.
A committee of revenue and civil aviation departments will be constituted for the possession of the land from the army, depending upon the availability of funds with the state government, the DC added.
On the terminal, he said, “the tender for ₹16.6 crore works will be open on July 20. An abandoned building on the Army land will be renovated and used as a temporary terminal. From here, buses will ferry passengers for the airplane and the air force strip will be used for flight operations. We are hopeful that soon the passengers will be able to board direct flights for Srinagar and Varanasi.”
The abandoned building is located behind peer on NH-444A (Ambala-Saha highway or Jagadhari Road) in the dairy farms area of the army.
This comes days after Haryana Airports Development Authority (HADA) also invited a tender to select an agency for conducting passenger and cargo surveys in Ambala and Hisar.
HADA aims to find out the number of annual aircraft operations, passengers and cargo volumes, for both domestic and international operations for Hisar and only domestic passenger and cargo traffic at Ambala, along with route-feasibility for the top 10 routes from both and traffic diversion from nearby airports.
The airport project, which has been in limbo for the last over four years, was approved under the Udan 3.0 scheme of Union ministry of civil aviation in December 2018, primarily due to land-related issues near the strategically important IAF base.
The land transfer was made possible after a series of deliberations by the state government and district administration with defence officials, and between defence minister Rajnath Singh and Haryana home minister Anil Vij.
