Hemlata Verma

Airports Authority of India

Airports Authority of India (AAI) was constituted by an Act of Parliament and came into being on 1st April 1995 by merging erstwhile National Airports Authority and International Airports Authority of India. The merger brought into existence a single Organization entrusted with the responsibility of creating, upgrading, maintaining and managing Civil Aviation infrastructure both on the ground and air space in the country.AAI manages 126 airports, which include 11 international airports, 89 domestic airports and 26 civil enclaves at Defence airfields. AAI provides air navigation services over 2.8 million square nautical miles of airspace. During the year 2002-03, AAI at various airports handled about 5 lakhs aircraft movements (4 lakhs domestic and 1 lakh international);40 million passengers (26 million domestic and 14 million international) and 9 lakh tonnes of cargo (3 lakh domestic and 6 lakh international).