Shame-Shabad

Shamshabad Airport. Oh I forgot it's called Rajiv Gandhi International Airport! Er... isn't there a Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium close to my house? Why is everything being named after this man. He was just another young guy who was forced into politics because of sudden deaths. He went on to become respectable. But naming everything after politicians? Is that the way to carry on with things? Why do we have all kinds of weird names for our buildings/parks/places/stadiums/etc...

Anyway, back to Shamshabad. It was supposed to kick off on 17th March. The Inagural Function turns out to be a fiasco. All the leaders present admited that the road facility will take more time and things are yet to be done. The promise of the Lufthansa landing for the first time at Shamshabad was broken. I expected that. It wasn't any surprise to hear that the opening would be delayed. It finally kicked off after a few days. Maybe they forgot to build a roof for the terminal and maybe they did it in 2 days. Right from Day 1, I went through all the reviews about the Airport. It's swanky, stylish, this and that. But the road transport is bad. The roads are not finished. The Autorickshaws demand Rs 500 for the trip to Shamshabad. The travel from city-center to the airport takes about 2 hours. And maybe your flight would take lesser time to reach the destination. If you want to catch a flight today evening, start after noon and hopefully you will not miss your flight. Just in case you want a visit to the rest room, don't ask the support staff coz they themselves don't know. Maybe there are all kinds off exclusive stuff there, Hard Rock Cafes, etc, but what's the use if you don't know how to find them? How bad would you feel if the pilot doesn't know "What's Shamshabad" and flies all the way to Mumbai just to land? How bad would it look if the staff were at the new airport and the cargo is left at the old airport? How bad would it look if the people are told that their plane takes off at HYD airport and they run to Begumpet only to realise that all traffic has been shifted to Shamshabad? Or how bad would it look if some foreigner guy lands at Shamshabad, expecting to see Begumpet like his previous visits, and starts wondering if the plane was hijacked and made to land at some deserted area? How would he know if he is in Hyd, or where he is in Hyd?
It's a long queue anyway coz out of the numerous counters, only 2-3 work and there's no staff to handle them. As a whole, it's like this. Wow! You just felt like you entered another world, another universe but you are lost. There's nobody to help you, and it's difficult to help yourself, judging by the size of the terminal. It was too much of a hurry. When I heard of the launch date, somewhere in 2007, I thought March 08 is a bit too early. Can our guys really pull it off? I knew they wouldn't, but I had a hope. They say they pulled it off, but with less than 50% of the work complete, I don't how they could say that. I don't know how they were bold enough to actually open the Airport before it was finished. It is supposed to meet international standards, and had to be ready to accommodate a greater number of people and planes. They clearly hurried with the opening. I wouldn't mind if they delayed it by a few months or maybe an year, by when they could have developed the area around it with proper connectivity and most importantly the so-called Express Way that would take you to the Terminal in 20 minutes.

I had thoughts when people were talking about the new Airport coming up. It's gonna be exquisite, International, quick and easy, has a huge runway, can swallow an Airbus 380, can handle lots of traffic, among the large ones in India, etc. But at the moment, most of them are wishing they were using the old, reliable Begumpet airport. And what's with the removal of the old airport? Don't we have so many alternate train stations? Can't we have an alternate airport just like that? I heard talks about private airports, just like private airlines. Maybe at that time, we can start seeing 3-4-5-6 airports within a town. Till then, we have to wait and watch how the government uses money. Will they use it to finish the terminal so that it looks well, like a Terminal? Or will they spend crores to organise bloody functions inviting VIP guests for them to have a look at an unfinished structure. I heard they spent about 20 crores to build a temporary air-conditioned hall for the guests on the Inagural Day. If that's really true, then they are really crazy.

At the moment, it's still Shame-shabad Airport. But it won't be long before it becomes Shamshabad Airport, with great cab service, Express Way connectivity, great stuff inside and outside and stunning looking. It won't be long ... I am just waiting for that day.