Govt to acquire land for expansion of Darbhaga airport soon

Land acquisition for the civil enclave and other development and expansion works at Darbhanga airport will start soon after the next state cabinet meeting.

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has applied for 78 acres of land in Darbhanga, including 54 acres for a new civil enclave with a terminal building, cargo, multi-level car parking, fire station, and other auxiliary buildings, and 24 acre for the installation of a category one (CAT I) approach light.

Sanjay Kumar, additional chief secretary of the state cabinet the secretariat department informed that the AAl had originally requested 31 acres of land, which the state government approved along with a payment of Rs 121 crore to the district administration for land acquisition.

Kumar said that the land could not be acquired because AAl officials inspected Darbhanga airport in January of this year and submitted a new proposal for 78 acre. The new proposal is expected to be presented at the next cabinet meeting.

In August of this year, the civil aviation minister wrote to Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, urging him to direct the concerned officials to expedite land acquisition work for Darbhanga and other airports in Bihar, including Patna, Muzaffarpur, and Raxual.

The runway extension, parallel taxi track, Doppler Very high-frequency Omni Range (DVOR) equipment, isolation bay, and glide path at Patna airport will require approximately 49.5 acres of land.

The additional chief secretary said that the state government has already permitted the isolation bay to be built on 12 acres of land and the DVOR to be installed on 4.5 acres of land.

Kumar informed that the AAl has requested 22 acres of land for a parallel taxi track.

ICAR owns 19 acres of land and the transport department owns 3 acre. The taxi track is currently in the process of acquiring land. There is currently no possibility of extending the runway.

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