Mysore Airport runway expansion project. Administrative glitches

Mysuru: Mysuru-Kodagu MP Pratap Simha has asked the officials from the Karnataka State Small Industries Development Corporation (KSSIDC) Limited to complete the land acquisition process by the end of January 2023 to facilitate extension of the Mysore Airport runway. If the January-end deadline is met, the actual work on the runway expansion can begin from March.

At a progress review meeting with KSSIDC Special Land Acquisition Officer (SLAO) Priyadarshini and other officers on Tuesday, the MP said that the State Government has earmarked Rs. 319.13 crore for the runway expansion project and the second instalment of Rs. 100 crore has already been released.

The first instalment of Rs. 50 crore was released some time ago and works including levelling the areas around 140 metres of the existing runway and freeing the areas of land gradients have already been taken up. “The Rs. 100 crore has been specifically released to acquire additional land for the project and officers must speed up the land takeover,”  he said.

The Airport is spread over 490 acres and an additional 240 acres and 22.9 gunta land has to be acquired. Of this, the 22.9 gunta land is already under the possession of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) and 11.09 acres is a canal, that is a  Government property.

Over 206 acres have to be acquired from private landowners and the State Government has issued a final notification for the acquisition of 160 acres. Notification is pending to acquire 46.22 acres. The Government has fixed the compensation at Rs.1.5 crore per acre. 

“I have asked the SLAO to utilise the Rs. 100 crore to address the land disputes wherever in the 240-acre land by depositing the amount in the Court and go ahead with the land acquisition. We have plans to perform the ground-breaking ceremony for the runway expansion in March 2023 and the KSSIDC will give an update on this by Jan. 20,” MP Pratap Simha told Star of Mysore.

As per the agreement between the State Government and Airports Authority of India, land has to be acquired by the State Government and handed over to the AAI for the works to begin. Initially, the AAI had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the KIADB for land acquisition. Later, the Cabinet made the KSSIDC Limited as the nodal agency that will oversee and facilitate the transfer of land to AAI and also the Airport expansion works.

At present, the Airport has a single runway of 1,740 metres in length which is only suitable for ATR planes providing short-haul flight operations. Under the expansion project, the length of the runway will be increased to 2,750 metres and 45 metres width that allows jet aircraft such as Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 to land.