Proposed airports in Telangana fail to take off

Hyderabad: Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia has assured the TS government to develop six airports in the State. This was what had been well propagated after he called on Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao on Saturday.

But the fact is that these airports are still in proposal stage for long and even after the new State was formed, there has not been much progress except for taking up land survey and techno feasibility study by the Airports Authority of India at some places.

Some even allege that this had led to steep hike in land value benefitting those who own huge patches of land in those areas and the surveys were meant for that purpose only.

The six airports that are still at proposal stage are Mamnoor in Warangal, Jakranpally in Nizamabad, Basant Nagar in Peddapalli, Kothagudem, Adilabad and Addakal in Mahbubnagar.

According to authorities, there is a scope for the development of airports at Jakranpally, Mahbubnagar and Kothagudem under Green category and Adilabad, Basant Nagar and Warangal under Brown category.

The airport at Basant Nagar used to have Vayudoot planes. Since these places are 150 km away from Shamshabad, there can be no issue with the construction of these airports.

Municipal Administration Minister KT Rama Rao in August 2020 had urged the Centre to start an airport at Mamnoor under the Central scheme UDAN (Ude Desh Ka Aam Nagrik). Though the then Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri assured to take up a quick survey there was no progress till date.

Officials said the AAI had taken up the survey at Kothagudem but the problem there was of land acquisition and environmental clearance as the area is surrounded by forest region.

Basant Nagar in Peddapalli has 265 acres, which was given to Tata group. The government proposed to take the land back and construct an airstrip. Jakranpally in Nizamabad has 850 acres of government land which is reserved for the airstrip.

The government had identified 385 acres of land for an airstrip in Adilabad. The government had taken up a survey with AAI at Addakal in Devarakadra town in Mahbubnagar district sometime back but there has been no progress yet.