TEAM HERALD
teamherald@herald-goa.com
PANJIM: While the Goa government has recently begun the environment impact assessment (EIA) study for the Greenfield international airport at Mopa, about 80 kms away, the Maharashtra government has already begun work on the Chipi International airport, slated for commission around 2016.
A delegation of Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation (MTDC), which is currently in Goa, has expressed willingness in providing land and other infrastructure facilities for the state, if required for the Mopa airport. MTDC officials are likely to have meeting with the State government on the matter.
Speaking to media persons, MTDC Managing Director Dr Jagdish Patil announced that Chipi would not be a domestic but an international airport with nearly 200 international flights landing every day. Chipi is the fourth airport in Maharashtra.
Patil said that Maharashtra attracts around 12 lakh foreign tourists every year and this year it is expected to rise by another 15 percent.
Later, at the sidelines of the media briefing, MTDC executive engineer Rahul Vasaikar said that the work of the Chipi airport has already begun and by 2016 it is expected to be commissioned. He said that the EIA study of the project has been completed and the airport construction work has been awarded to a private party called IRB Infrastructure Development Corporation Ltd.
The firm is building the airport on a build, operate and transfer (BOT) basis for the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) and an area of 1200 acres has been earmarked for the project.
When asked whether it would be economically viable to have two international airport at a short distance of 30 kms (by air), Vasaikar refusing to comment on the issue, instead said ‘I don’t think there would be any problem…we would be having talks with Goa government…they have land, infrastructure issue…we can have talks on that’.
