Jaitley announces jump in airport capacity by 5 times

Emphasizing on the Aviation industry, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in his Budget speech highlighted that India's airport capacity will increase by over five times.

"16 small airports have already started operations. Overall, the Government is in the process of developing 56 unserved airports and 37 helipads," said Jaitley in his Union Budget 2018 address over regional connectivity.

Adding to this, the minister told the Parliament that the government intends to multiply India's 124 airports to 5 times that number, which will help the airports to handle up to one billion trips a year.

The announcement will be pushed by the Narendra Modi government's regional connectivity scheme UDAN (Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik), which seeks to air connect India's small towns at affordable.

--ANI