No land acquisition notification yet for Pune airport

Pune: Will the proposed Pune international airport come up at Rajgurunagar near Chakan or shift to another site?
A question which remains unanswered as officials from the state government and the Maharashtra Airport Development Company (MADC), the implementing authority, are talking in different tongues.
"The project will come up at the very site that has been proposed at present," divisional commissioner Dilip Band told TOI on Thursday. Sources in MADC maintained that top officials from Pune district's administration had mooted an alternative site which is across the highway close to the present proposed site for the airport project during a meeting with deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar on March 9. "We are waiting for a joint survey to determine the suitability of such an alternative site," said an MADC official, who did not wish to be identified.
The company has already informed the government in the past that the present site at Rajgurunagar is not suitable for the airport project due to several factors including farmers' opposition to land acquisition, presence of vast tracts of forest land, difficulties in resurfacing of project area, and substantial irrigation activity in patches.
Talks about an alternative site began after Pawar, last November, said that if land acquisition issues are not resolved through the government machinery then private parties are an option for setting up the airport.
23/04/11 Vishwas Kothari/Times of India

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Categories: Airports Apr 2011