Warangal airport work to begin soon: Ram Mohan

Hyderabad: Civil Aviation Minister Kinjarapu Ram Mohan Naidu on Wednesday said works on Warangal airport would begin soon as the GMR had given its clearance to go ahead with the construction works.

Launching the Digital Twin Platform of GMR Airports here on Wednesday, Ram Mohan Naidu said the Bhogapuram Airport in Andhra Pradesh will be completed by June 2026.

The Minister said that the airport was not a transit point. "Airport must be a place where passengers feel a sense of belonging. A place that offers comfort wherein every journey feels like home coming,” he said.

He said the proposed Amendments to the 'Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against Safety of Civil Aviation Act 1982' is currently going through the inter-ministerial consultation process and the feedback is being collected. He said the Ministry of Civil Aviation is in the process of creating a “Centralised Data Repository” by collecting all the data from facilities such as DIGI Yatra and integrating them to be used for any policy decisions. “The second one (of the amendments to two civil aviation laws) is that we are having a SUASCA Act which deals with the offences related to civil aviation. We have proposed a small amendment. It is going through the inter ministerial consultation process. We are getting feedback from all the ministries concerned. We are trying to push it as soon as possible, but because it is a very important legislation, all the ministries have to give their opinion.

We are still waiting for that,” he said. After numerous hoax bomb threats, causing hardships to the passengers and several flights in October and November the Centre proposed amendments to SUASCA 1982 whereby the perpetrators could be arrested and a probe can be initiated without a court order for offences when an aircraft is on the ground. The Civil Aviation Minister said once the amendment to the Aircraft Security Rules is published in the Gazette, the hoax call perpetrators will be put under no-fly list. He further said The Civil Aviation Ministry is expecting the number of aircraft in India to go up to 2,300 from the existing 800 and encouraging more Flying Training Organisations (FTO) to be set up to meet the growing demand of pilots.

Naidu said passenger traffic in India is ever growing reaching new heights. Giving the data, he said Indian airports registered a 5.3 per cent growth in October this year at 1.36 crore domestic passengers compared to 1.26 crore during the same month last year. With five lakh domestic air passengers, November 17 will be remembered in the history of Indian aviation. The Minister said the number of airports in the country grew to 158 from 74 in 2014.