Noida airport project may get in-principle approval on April 23

The airport will be developed on a public-private partnership (PPP) model and Yeida has already made arrangements for the funds required for land acquisition

The Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (Yeida) is set to give a detailed presentation about the new greenfield Noida international airport project in Jewar to the ministry of civil aviation on April 23 to obtain an in-principle approval.

The airport project is estimated to ₹15,000 crore to ₹20,000 crore. On the whole, the project requires 5,000 hectares of land(Sunil ghosh/HT Photo)

The authority is hopeful that the steering committee, which will assess the detailed project report of this ambitious project, will give its in-principle nod, paving way for further progress on the project.

The steering committee consists of members from the ministries of civil aviation and defence and the Airports Authority of India, among others.

“The steering committee may give an in-principle approval on April 23 itself if it is satisfied with the technical preparedness. Once we have the approval, we will start the process of selecting a private agency that will develop the project,” Shailendra Bhatia, officer on special duty, Yeida, said.

Yeida is busy preparing the presentation. On April 3, Yeida had given a detailed presentation about the overall progress of the project. Satisfied with the progress, the ministry of civil aviation had asked the authority to seek an in-principle approval.

“We applied for the in-principle approval recently. Now after assessing our presentation, the ministry is likely to give the approval,” Bhatia said.

The ministry of civil aviation on June 24, 2017, had given its approval to build an international airport in Jewar. In December 2017, Yeida hired international agency PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) for preparing the techno-economic feasibility report (TEFR) of the project proposed in Jewar, along the 165km Yamuna Expressway that connects Greater Noida with Agra. The PwC submitted its TEFR report on April 15.

“On Saturday, we will prepare a detailed presentation with the help of PwC ,” Bhatia said.

The airport will be developed on a public-private partnership (PPP) model and Yeida has already made arrangements for the funds required for land acquisition.

“Once we get the in-principle approval, we will start preparing the bid document under which a private agency will be selected for developing the airport. The bid document will be prepared by PwC. We hope that we will issue a tender to hire the agency in June,” Bhatia said.

The airport project is estimated to ₹15,000 crore to ₹20,000 crore. On the whole, the project requires 5,000 hectares of land. In 2001, then UP chief minister Rajnath Singh had proposed the greenfield Taj International Airport and Aviation Hub (TIH) in Jewar. However, the project could not materialise till date. But, now, officials hope that April 23 will the day when the project finally starts taking shape.