Rajiv Gandhi International Airport celebrates 13th anniversary

With an initial capacity of 12 million passengers per annum (MPPA), the airport at present is in the mode of expansion to enhance its capacity to cater to over 34 MPPA

Hyderabad: The GMR Hyderabad International Airport here, popular as the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport, is celebrating its 13th anniversary on Tuesday.

The Hyderabad Airport, operated by a joint venture company promoted by the GMR Group (63%) in partnership with Airports Authority of India (13%), Government of Telangana (13%) and Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad (11%), was the first Greenfield airport under Public Private Partnership (PPP) model in the country.

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Commissioned in a record time of 31 months with an initial capacity of 12 million passengers per annum (MPPA) and 1,50,000 MT of cargo handling capacity per annum, the airport at present is in the mode of expansion to enhance its capacity to cater to over 34 MPPA.

The RGIA in December 2015 became the first airport in India to offer end-to-end E-boarding facility for all domestic flights, and today, it is the only airport in the country to offer 100% ‘stamping-free’ travel to its domestic passengers. It became the first and only airport in the country to offer ‘Express Security Check’ facility for passengers traveling with only hand-baggage in August 2017.

In July, 2019, RGIA became the first airport in India to initiate Face Recognition Trials. The airport has played a crucial role after resuming operations during the pandemic in May 2020 with the first Covid vaccine transshipment coming in January 2021.

The airport has consistently ranked in the Airports Council International (ACI) – Airport Service Quality (ASQ) Passenger Survey as among the Global Top 3 airports for nine consecutive years (2009 to 2017) including World No. 1 position for four times in 2009, 2010, 2016 and 2017. It was also featured as the world’s eighth best airport in AirHelp passenger survey score 2019 – the only Indian airport to feature among the top ten global airports.