Purandar International airport project in progress: Pune Divisional Commissioner Saurabh Rao

Mehab Qureshi

Pune, August 26, 2020: Divisional Commissioner Saurabh Rao on Tuesday said that the fund required for land acquisition at the proposed international airport at Purandar, about 45 km from Pune, would cost around Rs 6,000 crore. A proposal regarding this will be placed before the Deputy Chief Minister and District Guardian Minister Ajit Pawar on Friday (August 28), after which a final decision will be taken.

Rao told a press conference that various options were being discussed at the meeting attended by District Collector Dr Rajesh Deshmukh and other senior officials.

“This airport will cost around Rs 6,000 crore. For this, about 2832 hectares land in seven villages will have to be acquired. The options will be given to the project victims before starting the land acquisition process. We will be buying land in exchange for land. A proposal on those options will be prepared and handed over to Deputy Chief Minister Pawar. All the options will be discussed on Friday, and a final decision will be made on compensation for the project victims”, Rao informed.

Meanwhile, land in seven villages, namely Paragon, Khanwadi, Munjwadi, Ekhatpur, Kumbharwalan, Vanpuri, and UdachiWadi, will be acquired for the airport. For this process, Deputy Collector has been appointed as village wise Land Acquisition Officer. Moreover, the Maharashtra Airport Development Company (MADC) has compiled information on land maps, group numbers, and documentation of lands which are to be acquired in these seven villages. All the above information has been sent to the state government, said Rao.

CIDCO will own 51 percent, MADC 19 percent, MIDC and PMRDA 15 percent each for the construction of the airport. In February, the state government approved a grant of about Rs 45 crore to MADC to set up a joint venture for the development of the airport. Earlier, the state government had approved a supplementary demand of about Rs 225 crore for the development of airports in the state during the monsoon session. A provision of Rs 150 crore was made for setting up a joint venture for Purandar Airport. Out of this, Rs 45 crore has been sanctioned to MADC.

About Rs 2,713 crore funds will be compensated to the concerned after land acquisition; the replacement of fruit trees, wells and ponds will cost around Rs 800 crore, which sums up to Rs 3,515 crore. The final decision is yet to be made.