Delhi IGI Airport moves Delhi High Court to stop commercial flight operations from Ghaziabad Air Station

The Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL) has approached the Delhi High Court against the Central government’s decision to allow commercial flight operations from the Hindon Indian Air Force station in Ghaziabad..Justice Subramonium Prasad heard the matter on Wednesday and issued notices to the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MCA) and Airports Authority of India (AAI).The matter will be heard next on March 5.DIAL is a consortium led by GMR Group and manages Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI Airport).In its plea, DIAL has challenged the decision dated October 31, 2023 of the MCA allowing AAI to have scheduled commercial flight operations at the Indian Airforce Station situated in Hindon, Ghaziabad.DIAL has also challenged a communication issued by the AAI dated October 31, 2023 inviting various airline operators to increase flight operations and file their respective flight schedule for availing slots at the Hindon Airforce Station.It is DIAL’ case that allowing commercial flights from Hindon will not only be detrimental to the IGI Airport, but also render upcoming airport at Jewar and the Hindon Airforce Station itself unviable as it would result in three weak airports with all competing and eating into the revenues of each other.The petition argued that the steps taken by the government amount to establishment of a greenfield airport at Hindon and is in the teeth of MCA’s own policy mandating that no greenfield airport will normally be allowed within an aerial distance of 150 Km of an existing airport.The policy adds that another airport within the 150 Km distance of an existing one will be permitted if the capacity of the existing airport for its catchment area is saturated and it is unable to expand further to cater to more passengersDIAL claimed that the criteria is not fulfilled in the case of Hindon as neither is the IGI Airport unable to meet the projected traffic requirements nor has a new focal point of traffic with sufficient viability emerged for Hindon Airforce Station.“The Impugned Decision, Impugned Proposal and Impugned Communication also fails to consider that already a greenfield airport is being developed at Jewar with ultimate passenger capacity of more than 100 million passengers per annum (MPPA) within 150 km of the IGI Airport. Thereby, the aggregate passenger capacity of about 250 MPPA is being created in the NCR, which is projected to be sufficient till 2050,” the plea added. .DIAL was represented by a team of Trilegal through advocates Milanka Chaudhury, Naina Pankaj Dubey and Ravneet Singh.