Airports Authority of India is planning a bond issue to finance the development of 35 non-metro airports at a total cost of Rs.35,000 crore.

AAI has already drafted a phase-wise development programme. A global technical advisor and an international financial consultant have already been appointed, it is learnt. Ten airports will be modernized in Phase I. One of the options includes the formation of a public-private partnership for each airport.

The ten airports in question are Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Guwahati, Jaipur, Udaipur, Trivandrum, Lucknow, Goa, Madurai and Mangalore. Phase I will involve expenditure of Rs.1,874 crore and would take five years to implement.

Under Phase II, another 15 airports would be taken up for modernisation. These are Vadodara, Bhopal, Indore, Nagpur, Vizag, Bhubaneshwar, Coimbatore, Patna, Port Blair, Varanasi, Agatti, Aurangabad, Khajuraho, Rajkot and Trichy.