AGARTALA, Feb 3 (TIWN): Months after months the airport expansion work is progressing in snail pace and no major development is seen in the expansion work. After the Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) has given clearance to the plan of setting up new terminal building at Agartala Airport, authority is yet to take any action for starting the work progress of the airport expansion. Talking to TIWN correspondent, Airport director said that no major progress is seen in the expansion work. Reluctant to comment over the reason behind the slow progress of work, Director said that no initiative is taken to start the expansion work. Arranging tender for engaging Project Management Consultants to carry out the Rs. 338 crore projects in underway and if everything moves on accordingly the work might begin from February. He also stressed on the issue that until the tender is clarified nothing can be done regarding the construction.

The process of upgrading the Agartala airport to international standard is going on at snail's pace due to alleged indifferent attitude of various government agencies to removing hurdles related to the boundary wall work and runway expansion.

Poor connectivity was blamed for industrial backwardness in the city. In order to address it, the state government had planned to upgrade Agartala airport to international standard.

The state government has already handed over required land for facelift work of the Agartala airport.

Both the airports authority and the state government departments should work in tandem to speed up the airport expansion work. Initiative should be taken to remove all hurdles at the earliest.

However, the much awaited expansion project includes extension of runway to successfully accommodate wide bodied aircraft and to improve the passenger’s amenities. Four aero bridge provisions is likely to be there in the new terminal building, so that it can handle 1000 passengers on both departure and arrival at a time. Besides four conveyors belt will also inducted in the new terminal.

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.

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.