Airports of Delhi and Mumbai will have new passenger tariffs by the end of 2019, an Airports Economic Regulatory Authority (AERA) official said. The user charges for both passengers and airlines at these airports were to be revised from April 2019 for a period of five years, the third such control period for these marquee airports.
“The authority is still in the process of reviewing the tariff estimates submitted by Delhi and Mumbai airport operators. This will take around five months,” Sudhir Raheja, member, AERA, said.
GMR-owned Delhi International Airport (DIAL) and GVK’s Mumbai International Airport (MIAL) submitted their tariff cards this month. These estimates will be reviewed by the airport regulator before coming up with the final tariff order. AERA has appointed SBI Caps as consultant to carry out tariff determination for the two busiest airports of the country.
The Delhi airport tariffs for the 2014-19 control period were implemented after a delay of three years due to a legal challenge against the Aera order, slashing charges up to 90%. According to an estimate, over-recoveries by Dial between April 2014 and July 2017 when the reduced tariff order was implemented stood at more than Rs 5,000 crore. “This money will be adjusted for tariff determination in the coming tariff order,” Raheja added.
While passenger traffic at IGI airport grew 5.4% year-on-year to 69 million during 2018-19, CSI airport registered 0.7% y-o-y increase in passenger footfall to 49 million.
Tariffs at Delhi’s IGI airport are set to go up due to proposed expansion work, while the airport fees at Mumbai airport is likely to come down with no scope for capital expenditure at the aerodrome. DIAL plans to spend Rs 9,000 crore by 2022 for terminal buildings, new runway and taxiways.
