The official date for the first flight to take off from the newly constructed airport in Bengaluru has been decided as 0001 hours, March 29, 2008.

An international airport was long overdue in Bengaluru, which has a large number of people from the international community visiting it, thanks to the city attaining the status of India's Silicon Valley.

Ironically, all these years, Bengaluru did not have a full-fledged airport and was relying on the services of the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited airfield. The government had entered into an understanding with HAL and was making use of their airfield for both domestic and international flights.

However, as the years passed by, it became necessary to have a bigger airport as the number of passengers and flights were on the rise. But it was not an easy task to actually set up the airport.

History

First land was identified at Devanahalli, a village 30 kilometer from Bengaluru. The estimated cost of the project was Rs 1,334 crore (Rs 13.34 billion) with the state government's share being Rs 350 crore (Rs 3.50 billion). However with time the project cost went up to Rs 1,412 crore (Rs 14.12 billion) at the time of signing the concession agreement, and at the time of completion the cost stands at Rs 1,930 crore (Rs 19.30 billion). Read on . . .

Text: Vicky Nanjappa

Image: Work going on at the passenger counters at the new Bengaluru International Airport.