Date:22/02/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/02/22/stories/2007022205081900.htm

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Business

Changi, Tatas to bid for Chennai, Kolkata airports

Special Correspondent

The joint venture may also invest in non-metro airports

To bid for city-side development of non-metro airports

West Bengal and Tamil Nadu governments have different ideas

WINDOW TO AVIATION: Civil Aviation Secretary, Ashok Chawla (right), and K. Ramalingam (left), Chairman, Airport Authority of India, at the inauguration of Inter Airport India International Exhibition in New Delhi on Wednesday. — PHOTO: SANDEEP SAXENA

NEW DELHI: Singapore's Changi Airports International on Wednesday announced that it had decided to enter into a strategic alliance with the Tata Group to pursue airport projects in India.

Both sides have signed a memorandum of understanding to invest in, develop and manage Indian airports and the joint venture will bid for the modernisation works of airports in Chennai and Kolkata as also vie for similar projects in non-metro airports.

"We are partnering with the Tatas to get the contracts for modernisation work in Kolkata and Chennai airports,'' Changi's Vice President (India) Ng Tim Peng said here. While the Tatas hold a controlling 51 per cent stake in the joint venture company, Changi would own the balance.

Centre yet to decide

No final decision has yet been taken by the Centre on the course of modernising these two metro airports, though the West Bengal Government has felt that the Kolkata airport should be developed by the Airports Authority of India, while the Tamil Nadu Government favours the public-private partnership route which has been taken for modernisation of Delhi and Mumbai airports.

This is the second time the Tatas are entering the aviation sector in the recent past. Earlier, the Tatas had tied up with Singapore Airline to bid for flag carrier Air-India when it was proposed to be privatised, but the process failed to take off.

"At present, we are concentrating on Kolkata and Chennai airports modernisation projects,'' Mr. Peng said replying to queries while visiting Inter Airport India, a premier airport exhibition which opened in Pragati Maidan here. The existing airport in Chennai has a passenger traffic of 6.77 million passengers annually and is now the third busiest airport in India, while the Kolkata airport has a traffic of 4.4. million and is the fifth busiest airport.

The joint venture firm also plans to bid for city-side development of 35 non-metro airports. The scope of the joint venture will extend to investments in other airports, including regional airports as well as airports which have already been privatised.

On the aviation market in India, Chow Kok Fong, CEO of Changi Airports International, said: "At present, the air travel intensity per capita in India corresponds to 0.5 per cent that of Singapore and the West. India is likely to see sustained economic development, approaching double digits, a proof that the momentum for growth is truly awesome.''