Shri S. Sittarasu Head Marketing, Maharashtra Airport Development Company Ltd., (MADC), thank FICCI for giving us an opportunity to address this august gathering on the subject.
As you are aware that Maharashtra, the State I represent, is the second largest State in India and the most urbanized one. It has very vast potential for development in Civil aviation Sector. The State of Maharashtra which comprises of 6 divisional head quarters and 35 districts. The Govt. has planned to inter-connect all the divisional head quarters and district head quarters with state capital 24 X 7 regular air network. The divisional head quarters will be taken up followed by connecting district head quarters with feeder network. State also wishes to develop Helipads\Heliports at all major Taluka Head Quarters so that it can be used for official use and in emergencies like natural calamities. All these airports\air strips proposed to have night landing facilities and to catchment area and add to the growth of and tier 2 and tier 3 cities.
The State of Maharashtra has 28 airports\ airstrips out of which major airport like Mumbai, Pune, Aurangabad and Nagpur have International operations on 24 X 7. MADC has 9 airports in various phases of developing stages viz Nagpur, Pune, Shirdi and Sholapur and Gardchoroli being the green field airports, Amravati, Karad, Chandrapur, Paltan are brown field projects, which contributes to major part of traffic of the Country.
Maharashtra perhaps only State having dedicated company MADC for the development of Airports in State. One of the Greenfield International airport being developed at Shirdi (Popular pilgrimage destination), which has completed its runway (2500X45 mts) along with Taxiway and apron. The airport Designed for 4C aircrafts with the passenger terminal building of 2200 sqm, which is expected be operated for commercial use from Jan 2015.
Other Airports are in different stages of progress.
MIHAN, Nagpur
MIHAN is the flagship project of MADC, I would like to draw your attention to a major prestigious project, which Govt. of Maharashtra has undertaken at Nagpur. The project envisages up gradation of existing Nagpur International Airport into a Multi-modal International Hub Airport at Nagpur (MIHAN) along with a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) abutting to the airport. The SEZ activities of MIHAN are Governed by MADC, whereas MIHAN India Ltd. (MIL), a JV company of MADC and AAI looks after Nagpur International airport.
2. Nagpur’s unique location makes it ideal for passenger and Cargo Hubbing on the air routes between South-East Asia, Middle-East Asia and Europe. Development of an interface among the three modes of transportation viz. Air, Rail and Road creates enormous opportunity for a Multi-modal International Hub Airport to make it an ideal destination for aviation and avionic industries. Nagpur is the one of the busiest Air Traffic Control centre of India where more than 650 flights overfly. Nagpur airport handles 24 flights landing and take-off on daily basis.
3. All the preparatory work for take-off of Expansion and Up-gradation of Nagpur Airport have about 1400 hectares area has been almost completed. After expansion, the airport will comprise of two independent parallel runways of 4000 Mtrs. X 60 Mtrs. With a Terminal Building sandwiched in between having an area of 3 Million Sq. Fts. Which can handle upto 60 Million passengers. The airport will also have the parking capacity of holding 100 aircrafts at a time to meet the rapidly growing traffic in India and provide the required world-class infrastructure for the booming Indian Aviation Sector.
4. 70 hectares of land has been earmarked for MRO facilities. M/S NACIL an JV of BOEING Inc. and Air India setting the MRO facility on about 35 hectares area with an investment of US $ 100 Million. This MRO will have one of the most modern facilities in the sub-continent and will service aircrafts such as BOEING 737, BOEING 777 and Dreamliner BOEING 787 of both domestic and International carriers. The MRO facility will also have 2-wide body hangars and a GE 90/GE NX Engine overhaul workshop. There are some companies have also expressed interest and in process of establishing MRO facility.
5. I express to august gathering that MADC – MIL will commission the crucial taxiway link from active runway of its airport to Boeing MRO which will be completed within three months. This MRO facility can be availed by all International and domestic carriers in India itself thereby saving huge time and money.
6. Once the infrastructures for independent parallel runway operation along with passenger and Cargo Terminal of International standard is in place, not only Country will be benefited as the Cargo imported into India can be cleared/housed and can be shifted to various cities within catchment area on Hub and Spoke system.
7. MIHAN SEZ is the perhaps the leading operational Multi-product SEZ in India abutting airport spread over an area of 2000 Hectors with State of art infrastructure. This development have incurred cost of around 2000 Crs. MADC have provided land to 70 investors in MIHAN for development of their facilities and have been created for employment, investment and export oriented activities. Indian IT giant TCS is fast competing large campus on 54 acre of land. Their first phase shall be complete to employ around 4000 heads by June 2014 and another 4000 head count by end of this year. Infosys have recently laid their foundation stone to develop an IT/ITES campus on their 142 acres of land have plane to construct 1 million sq.ft in the first phase and generation employment about 5000 people within 24 months. In the second phase have planned to employ another 15000 people. Besides, 10 companies are different phases of construction, there are another 10 companies are already operational including Caliber point and Tata Aeronautical exporting their product. TCI, Mahindra Tec have completed major part of construction with Lupin have commissioned their plant. Container Corporation of India will develop rail terminal and Metro Rail project would commence their construction activities soon. Total land allotted is around 1400 acre.
In total MIHAN has created direct employment of around 2500 people and indirect of 5000, totaling around 7500 people and companies have investment of around 5000 Crs and the operational companies exported around 115 Crs. MIHAN when fully operational shall be provided direct employment of 1.2 lacs and Indirect employment of 2.4 lacs.
This five day India Aviation 2014 will bring in some more good news to Maharashtra and MIHAN we are shall continue to peruse with Mr. Srinivasan Dwaranath, CEO Airbus for setting up their MRO and Mr. Bruce Blythe, President Customer Business, Rolls Royce invited them to explore setting up their manufacturing unit. I have met Shri Dr Dinesh A.Keshkar, VP Sales, Boeing, India & Asia Pacific.