Mumbai: The proposed international airport at Navi Mumbai is indefinitely delayed, leaving investors, politicians, builders and land traders in the lurch. Ever since the airport was announced a few years ago, speculators put a heavy premium on land surrounding the site of the new airport. Land prices shot up manifold as investors believed they would reap a bonanza once the airport came up. But early this month, chief minister Prithviraj Chavan confessed that the government was in no position to fix a timeline to start construction work. Cidco, the nodal agency for the project, is yet to acquire 475 hectares of private land for the airport, which is to be spread over 2,072 hectares. Of the 475 hectares, about 291 are required for aeronautical purposes.
26/04/13 Nauzer K Bharucha/Times of India
