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Addressing the meeting, Civil Aviation minister Ajit Singh said that aviation has
emerged as one of the most important growth engines of the country during the 11th
Plan period. During the last 10 years for instance, compounded annual growth rate
of passenger traffic has been approximately 15 per cent. He also pointed out that
Low Cost Carriers were getting more the traffic.
Elaborating on simplification of procedures for sanctioning buildings around
airports, Ajit Singh said that the Government has decided to do away with the
system of taking NOC from Airports Authority of India (AAI) every time and has
now prescribed the height at different distances from the airports up to which
the local municipal authority will be empowered to sanction the map of the area
around airports. The builder/applicant will have to come to AAI only if they want
to consider building higher than the prescribed heights.
He informed that apart from 5 major airports already operationalised under Joint
Venture/ PPP mode, Government has given in principle approval for setting up of 15
new Greenfield airports including Goa , Navi Mumbai and Kannur. He outlined the
priority areas of the Ministry which included providing greater connectivity to
smaller and remote parts of the country, development of low-cost airports, reduction
of VAT on ATF, bringing ATF under the ambit of PNGRB Act, India to be developed as
an international hub, creation of a Civil Aviation Authority and also of Civil Aviation
Security Force.
Mr Ajit Singh also said that India ’s GPS Aided GEO Augmented Navigation System known
as GAGAN developed by AAI with the support of ISRO is likely to be rolled out by July,
2013.
Incidentally, GAGAN is one of the most sophisticated ventures in aircraft connectivity.
US defence and civil aviation technology giant Raytheon is setting up the required ground
network to maintain it.
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