A Brand New Gateway

Tourism in Goa gets a boost with the new airport at Mopa set to enhance passenger handling capacity and ease congestion

- MANISH PANT

Since change is life’s only constant, it ensures that priorities also evolve. The new international airport at Mopa in Goa is a prime example of this dynamism. Prime Minister Narendra Modi indicated as much while inaugurating the country’s 10th greenfield airport on December 11. Assuring that the airport would help ensure all-round development in the region, he said, “The Manohar International Airport is an example of the changing soch (mindset) as well as approach of the government… The luxury tag attached to aviation had led the previous governments to curtail spending on the sector. They failed to understand that even the middle class aspired to travel by air.”

Recognised as one of the most favoured tourist destinations globally, Goa’s newest airport is named after the late former chief minister of the state, Manohar Parrikar, who had also served as the country’s defence minister. Located in the Pernem taluka of North Goa district, it is the western state’s second international airport.

Despite being approved in principle over two decades ago in March 2000, the greenfield airport project hit several snags. Having weathered stiff political opposition and resistance from the powerful tourism lobby in the southern part of the state, along with a clutch of public interest litigations challenging its clearance from the National Green Tribunal, the construction of the project had also slowed down during the Covid19-induced lockdowns.