Airports - Night Curfew in India

IGI Airport Delhi – Another Planning Mess


I am frequent flier and keep hopping in and out of Delhi very often. I remember the days when for the fist time the skies were opened for private airlines like Modiluft, Eastwest, Jet Sahara and few small airlines. In the evening while returning from Bangalore, Mumbai or Calcutta the Airline staffers used to invite passengers the way touts invite passengers at Inter State Bus Terminals. Free flow of liquor in Private airlines used to be major attraction for the passengers in the skies. As a frequent flier I did get free tickets from Modiluft but by the time I could travel the Airline did not exist.

Thereafter, for some time the private players remained subdued and once again the Private players returned with a bang. Very often I had to catch a n early flight to ensure that I don’t miss hearing at Court or Tribunal and used to catch the last flight so that I do not end up in catching a flight that hovers around for quite some time in the skies.

Then came up the proposal of privatization of airports and Delhi, Hyderabad, Bangalore Calcutta, Mumbai and Chennai Airports were put on private development mode. The shifting of Airports out of the cities of Delhi, Bangalore, and Hyderabad was a welcome step as all these three airports were situated in the middle of the City as such in view of growing air traffic resulting into high levels of noise pollution and high costs of hovering over the Cities. The moving Airports out of the City was also necessitated due the fact that any human error on the part of the Pilot could lead to massive tragedy as had happened with Sahara Training Aircraft at Palam Airport at New Delhi. Finally the airports at Bangalore and Hyderabad shifted out of towns. The IGI Airport for the reasons best known to the planners of the City continued to remain at the same location despite having planned to shift out of Delhi in various Master Plans prepared by the DDA and Ministry of Urban Development.

One day I was shaken out of deep sleep with loud noise and thereafter one after the other many panes started moving in the direction towards airport. I could not realize till the time the News appeared both in Print and Electronic Media about operation of third runway at IGI. So our life became miserable thereafter as almost 64 plans started landing within span on one minute and it became difficult to even talk on telephone leave alone sleeping peacefully in the afternoon or in the night. One of my neighbors who was disturbed as none in his family could sleep be it his grand daughter or himself or his wife or aged parents came to me and suggested to find out as to how all of a sudden this Runway became operation in utter disregard to environmental norms, International civil aviation rules and without necessary Environmental clearances. That just reminded me that similar situation arose at Heathrow Airport where the residents joined hands together and fought and made Government to think and act by insulating all the houses falling within landing funnel from Noise Pollution and also clamp night curfew on flights. So I decided to file the applications under Right to Information Act 2005.

Since the landing approach to newly constructed Runway 3 covers vast area of residential colonies like Mehrauli, Vasant Kunj, Mahipalpur having many schools and hospitals the operation of Runway 3rd sounded to be the most illogical decision as it s not only against the noise pollution norms laid down by the Central Pollution Control Board but also is in violation of the mandate of the International Civil Aviation Organization and Building Bye laws of DDA.

Earlier the landing funnel covered Jawaharlal Nehru University near Vasant Vihar, South Central Ridge Area where the height of the buildings falling within landing funnel was restricted to two stories obviously with logic. But now the flight path covers four storied buildings that show the criminal negligence on the part of the planners. Moreover when the terrorist threat on ground is so serious, who knows when some one may target any aircraft flying at such a low height and cause massive damage to life and property?

The information received from CPCB, Ministry of Civil Aviation came as a rude shock to me. The gist I am reproducing here under:-

Noise Pollution Permitted Limits


Area Code Category of Area/Zonw Limits in dB(A) Leg
Day Night
A Industrial Area 75 70
B Commercial 65 55
C Residential 55 45
D Silence Zone 50 40


CPCB had conducted surveys around IGI to monitor the Noise Pollution levels in and around Vasant Kunj, that was during material time away from landing Funnel was as under:-

Spot of survey: JNU

Sr. No Date of Monitoring *Time Results (Leq)
(dBA)
1 12-04-2004 Night Time 60.27
13-04-2004 Day time 62.38
2 21-04-2004 Night Time 59.32
22-04-2004 Day time 61.27
3 15-07-2007 Night Time 65.9
16-07-2007 Day Time 65.8

• Night Time – From 10.00 pm to 6.00 AM (8 hours)
• Day time – From 6.00 AM to 10 PM (16 hours)

Since during the material time of survey the aircrafts were descending over the Ridge Area as such the noise pollution level at JNU was much lesser than the present levels that ranges between 100dB during day time and around 120 dB at night time while landing the aircrafts over residential areas of Mehrauli, Vasant Kunj and Mahipalpur.

Further, the response from Ministry of Civil Aviation also came to me as another shock the relevant text of which is as under:-

As per the rules framed by International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) in in its annexure 2 on Rules of the Air at Para 3.1.2 has prescribed the following standards (relating to residential colonies falling under landing funnel)in this regard, the relevant text is reproduced as under:-

“except when necessary for take off or landing, or except by permission from the appropriate authority, air craft shall not be flown over the congested areas of the cities, towns or settlements or over an open air assembly of persons, unless at such a height as will permit, in the event of an emergency arising, a landing to be made without undue hazard to persons or property on the surface.”

Therefore, it is clear that except for emergency no plane could fly over the residential areas and land as a matter of routine except in the case of emergency. Now armed with this information I decided to find out as to how the Ministry of Environment and Forests has cleared the project and accorded Environmental Clearance. I did know that I would be in for another rude shock as in India we can expect any thing to happen. The response under RTI from MOEF is not only shocking but clearly indicates a classic case of non application of mind. The relevant text is reproduced as under:-

Environmental clearance accorded by the Ministry vide its letter no. Environmental Clearance – IGI Runway - DIAL- 3 by MOEF – File No. 10-10/2006-IA-lll dated 17th January 2007. The relevant text is reproduced hereunder:-

“Trees in the airport limits are proposed to be cut. It is indicated that that the noise dispersion model has been studied at the runway and that the sound level ranges from 65 dB to 85 dB. The sound level measured at the nearby residential area is 51 to 57 dB. Several mitigation measures to reduce the impact have been proposed which includes orientation of runway, proper scheduling of the aircraft and use of acoustic noise absorbing materials and green cover development. Noise level will be maintained (as prescribed for Industrial ctivity) as under as under noise standards notified.”


The DATA appearing in MOEF report is diametrically opposite to the survey conducted by CPCB thus the operation of Runway 3 is clearly in violation of all the norms and the laws.

It is matter of record that World over in view of the noise pollution the Airports are at least two hours drive from the City so that the ghost of noise pollution does not haunt the resident. The reason being due to higher noise pollution the residents would suffer from Insomnia (Sleepless ness) leading to higher stress levels, high blood pressure and heart related ailments.

It may not be out of place to mention here that initially the Airlines charged “Congestion Charges” from the passengers for no fault on its part as the Government and private airline operators increased the number of flights causing mid air congestion without augmenting the basic infrastructure in and around Airports. Still one could get away with bearing cost of negligence by the Government and the Airlines but the moot question now arises who would bear the cost of criminal negligence committed by the Planners and Government functionaries who have planned and implemented the third runway little realizing that people would suffer from the multiple complications and the damage cannot be quantified in monetary terms.

The worst is that none of the Authorities i.e. DGCA, Ministry of Civil Aviation, CPCB and Commissioner Police have come out of the deep slumber despite the fact that the Citizens have lodged formal complaints. Strangely the Commissioner Police Delhi who is the designated authority under the Pollution control Rules, has also failed to act.

That reminds me the popular mandate of the Constitution of India “Government of the people by the People and for the people” that stands now changed to “Government of the few by the few and for the few” because if Safdarjang Airport can be closed for Security reasons as well as for Noise Pollution why the IGI could not be shifted on same grounds out of the City in line with the one at Hyderabad and Bangalore?