Flying out of Mumbai? It will be costlier from tomorrow

The private airport operator currently levies a development fee of Rs 600 from an international passenger and Rs 100 from a domestic traveller.

Flying out of the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai is set to get costlier with an additional levy of up to Rs 120, to fund the metro rail connectivity to the aerodrome, coming into effect from Friday.

Tariff regulator Airports Economic Regulatory Authority had in January this year allowed Mumbai International Airport Limited to charge an additional levy of Rs 20 from each domestic flier and Rs 120 from each international traveller as development fee to fund a metro rail project.

The additional levy would be applicable from April 1, 2016 and remain in force till March 31, 2021, AERA had said in its order.

MIAL is a 26:74 joint venture between the GVK group led consortium and the Airports Authority of India.

The private airport operator currently levies a development fee of Rs 600 from an international passenger and Rs 100 from a domestic traveller.

MIAL had last year sought AERA's permission to charge additional development fee, to fund the metro rail project.

Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation, the project implementing company for all metro rail corridors across the western metropolis, is to construct a 32.5-km underground line, connecting Colaba in South Mumbai to SEEPZ in western Andheri suburb.

The Colaba-SEEPZ line, to be built at a projected cost of Rs 23,136 crore (Rs 231.36 billion), will have 27 stations, of which three stations fall under the Chhatrapati Shivaji Airport area.

MIAL's total contribution in the project is pegged at Rs 777 crore (Rs 7.77 billion)

The private operator claims that the journey time to Mumbai airport from Colaba will be reduced by 50-70 minutes once the three proposed stations come up by 2019.

Meanwhile, fliers from here could be asked to shell out more from May as AERA has earlier this month recommended a seven per cent hike in the charges at Mumbai Airport as against a demand of 104.82 per cent by MIAL for the second control period (April 2014-March 2019).

The charges are revised after a period of five years.

The first control period for the Mumbai airport ended on March 31, 2014.

Image: Mumbai airport. Photograph: Kind courtesy MIAL