National

Airport to be named after Charan Singh

NEW DELHI: The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved the renaming of Lucknow airport as Chaudhury Charan Singh Airport by way of paying tributes to the former Prime Minister.

Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram denied that the decision was to woo Charan Singh’s son and Rashtriya Lok Dal president Ajit Singh in view of the trust vote in Parliament.

The RLD has three Lok Sabha members, including Mr. Singh and the party is currently not aligned with any of the three groupings — the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance, the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance or the Left front.

Mr. Chidambaram said it was a long-pending demand of the people of Uttar Pradesh and the decision was to honour their sentiments.

“Over the past several years, governments in Uttar Pradesh have raised the demand for naming the airport after the late Prime Minister many times.”

The Cabinet reviewed the implementation of the Prime Minister’s new 15-point programme for minorities. Mr. Chidambaram said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh expressed satisfaction over its progress and wanted it to be accelerated.

The Cabinet gave its nod for funding six more operational flights of the Geo-synchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV).

The six flights (F11 to F16) were expected to be realised during 2010-12. This was in addition to seven flights (F4 to F10) approved in December 2006.

The mission was in keeping with the goal of the Indian Space Research Organisation to launch two GSLV flights every year during the 11th Plan period to meet the increasing demand for transponders.

An assessment by ISRO showed that there could be a demand for 500 transponders by the end of the 11th Plan period. Presently, the Indian national satellite system had 211 transponders.

Noting that ISRO had been able to progressively increase the GSLV payload from 1,540 to 2,150 kg through use of S139 solid core stage, high performance liquid engines, miniaturised avionics and mission optimisation, Mr. Chidambaram said plans were afoot to increase it further to 2,400 kg through the use of indigenous cryogenic upper stage.

The Cabinet also approved upgrading of 5,000 km of single/intermediate/two-lane national highways into two lanes with paved shoulders under the National Highways Development Project Phase IVA on build, operate and transfer (BOT) basis and at a cost of Rs. 6,950 crore.

The upgrading work on 4,000 km would be on the BOT (toll) mode and the remaining 1,000 km on the BOT (annuity) mode.

The Cabinet also gave its nod for signing a memorandum of understanding between the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development, Kathmandu, Nepal, and the Govind Ballabh Pant Institute of Himalayan Environment and Development, Almora.

It would provide an institutional mechanism for undertaking mutually beneficial research activities in the Himalayan region by the two organisations. It would be valid for five years.

The Cabinet gave its approval for the ratification of Belarus’ accession to annexe B of Kyoto Protocol under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and gave its ex-post facto clearance for the signing of an extradition treaty with Brazil.

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