The Adani Group plans to invest Rs 1 lakh crore in its airports business over the next five years, betting on strong and sustained growth in India’s aviation sector, according to Jeet Adani, director of Adani Airports. Speaking to news agency PTI ahead of the launch of commercial operations at Navi Mumbai International Airport, he said the group remains highly bullish on the industry’s long-term prospects.“On the airport side, Rs 1 lakh crore in the next five years,” Jeet Adani was quoted by news agency PTI, adding that India’s aviation ecosystem could grow at 15–16 per cent annually for the next decade or more. He pointed to low per-capita air travel in India compared to China, noting that even reaching Chinese levels would require the sector to expand across multiple cities.Navi Mumbai International Airport is set to begin commercial operations on December 25, marking a major expansion of the group’s airport portfolio. The project is being developed by Navi Mumbai International Airport Ltd, in which the Adani Group holds a 74 per cent stake. Built at an initial cost of Rs19,650 crore, the airport’s first phase will be able to handle 20 million passengers a year, with capacity planned to scale up to 90 million passengers over time.Jeet Adani said the new airport would ease pressure on Mumbai’s existing Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, which has faced capacity constraints for years. “Mumbai Airport was supply constrained from 2016 onwards and wasn’t able to service the additional demand that was coming through,” he said, adding that the commissioning of Navi Mumbai would finally bring some relief.Calling the opening a landmark moment for Indian aviation, he said the project still has significant room to grow. “There is four times growth still left to do,” he noted.Beyond Mumbai, the Adani Group operates six other airports, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Guwahati, Thiruvananthapuram, Jaipur and Mangaluru, and had earlier acquired Mumbai airport from the GVK Group. Jeet Adani said the group plans to bid “very aggressively” for all 11 airports identified for the next round of privatisation.On investments in aircraft services such as MRO and flight simulation training centres, he said it was too early to commit numbers, though the group remains deeply invested in expanding its expertise. “We want to keep growing our expertise and our depth,” he said.Through Adani Airport Holdings Ltd, the group is now India’s largest airport infrastructure operator, controlling about 23 per cent of passenger traffic and roughly 33% of cargo movement nationwide. Alongside capacity upgrades, the company is also expanding non-aeronautical services and city-side developments, as it looks to build diversified revenue streams.
