AGARTALA, Dec 24 (TIWN): After the Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) has given clearance to the plan of setting up new terminal building at Agartala Airport, Airport director on Wednesday said that there is not much progress in the work of the Agartala airport. Talking to TIWN correspondent, Airport Director on Wednesday said that the Airports Authority of India (AAI) has invited tender for engaging Project Management Consultants for carrying out the Rs. 338 crore projects. He further said that until the tender is not clarified nothing can be done regarding the construction. It is worthy to be mentioned here that the state government has already handed over required land for facelift work of the Agartala airport.However, the project includes extension of runway to help accommodate wide bodied aircraft and expansion and improvement of the passenger’s amenities. Four aero bridge provision will there in the new terminal building, so that it can handle 1000 passengers both departure and arrival at a time. However the present terminal can handle only 500 passengers. Besides four conveyors belt will also inducted in the new terminal.Airport Director also said the new terminal building would be at least double its present size and the size of the apron would be four times bigger than the current size.

The director informed that the estimate cost for constructing the new terminal building will be around Rs 250 crore. For beefing up the security in the Airport, 87 CCTV cameras have been installed in the airport.Days are not so far when the facelift work of the Agartala airport will kick off its work from the end of April. If everything falls in place, the facelift work for the Agartala airport would start from next year.Agartala Airport will be renovated and as well as will be made more updated.  In total 3 demands had been placed before the central Ministers, to announce Agartala Airport as International Airport, to increase the number of flights, to fix flight fares.

AAI has been incurring a loss of Rs 9 crore every year from Agartala, which also prompted the aviation body to push for the modernization of the airport. The existing runway would be expanded to almost double its present length and all modern safety equipment will be installed in the airport. At least two hangers will be built for parking six Boeing aircrafts and four aerobridges with the extension provisions of two more would be added to the terminal building for passengers' safety and comfort.

Agartala Airport expansion is a much awaited project in the state and the expansion project is underway.