Privatisation seems to be the way forward at least for the aviation sector. Going by the intentions of the Modi government, a majority of the airports in India would come under the Public Private Partnership (PPP).
According to report of the Department of Economic Affairs, the government aims to privatise 30-35 airports as PPPs. Presently, the government leased out six airports and is in the process of leasing out six more.
Why is the government so keen on privatising airports, one may ask? There is a belief that it helps develop infrastructure when private parties involve as the government would not be able to spend so much money in the 137 airports that is under the Airports Authority of India.
Out of the 137, 103 are domestic airports many is small cities that need an upgrade. By involving private partnership, the government looks to ramp up infrastructure. The government has approved the proposal to lease out three Airports-Jaipur, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram, through PPP to Adani Enterprises.
The airports that have been privatized include Lucknow, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Mangalore, Thiruvananthapuram and Guwahati. Proposals are underway for the privatization of six more namely: Raipur, Indore, Amritsar, Trichy, Bhubaneshwar and Varanasi.
Another reason for the government to step up the need for PPP model is the success rate of five PPP airports namely Mumbai, Delhi, Cochin, Hyderabad and Bengaluru together handle 55 per cent of the country’s traffic.
