The left-wing trade union, CITU, has slammed the Centre’s move to privatise the Chennai, Kolkata, Jaipur and Ahmedabad airports after spending more than Rs5,000 crore from public exchequer for modernisation. The trade union leaders Tapan Sen and AK Padmanabhan in statement on Sunday alleged that the Centre has made plans to hand over these four airports to corporate like Tata, Adani, Siemens and IBDF Zurich.
Coming down heavily on the Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju for “authoritarian” attitude, the left wing’s trade union said the NDA Government was just continuing the crony capitalism. They pointed out that Rs3,700 crore alone spent on the modernisation of Chennai and Kolkata airports in 2013.
“CITU strongly opposes the retrograde move of the Government to privatise the vital revenue earning airports of the country. The Government have invited ‘Request For Qualification’ (RFQ) from doemostic and overseas private players to handover the management and operation of Chennai, Kolkata, Jaipur and Ahmedabad airports.
Blaming the NDA Government for moving ahead with the scandalous move of the previous UPA Government, the CITU said the Civil Aviation Ministry was virtually enabling gift to the corporate houses by handing over the most revenue earning airports.
Supporting the protests and strikes of employees of AAI, the trade union said the Government must desist from this move. “This is nothing but a calculated move of the Government to transfer huge public assets to domestic and foreign corporate houses virtually as a gift enabling them to earn huge revenue and amass enormous profit without any capital investment,” said CITU.