Ahmedabad crash: Who allowed tall buildings and a slum near the airport?

A week after a London-bound Air India flight crashed in Ahmedabad's Meghaninagar area, killing all but one passenger on board and several others on the ground, a question begs to be asked. Why did the state government fail to facilitate land acquisition to enhance the runway safety area of Ahmedabad's Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (SVP) International Airport?

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The BJ Medical College in the city paid a heavy price for the air crash. Within minutes of taking off, the ill-fated Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner crashed into the four-storey Atulyam–11 building, housing the residential quarters of senior resident doctors, and the three-storey undergraduate hostel of BJ Medical College. Both buildings suffered heavy damage, leaving eight people, including doctors and their kin, dead.

At the Meghaninagar slum, the point of the crash of the aircraft, 34 were killed and 112 were left severely injured.

While the death of the air passengers and crew is a topic for another probe and discussion, the deaths on the ground were certainly more avoidable.

It may be noted that the Medicity Project, of which the BJ Medical College is a part, was pushed ahead when Narendra Modi was the chief minister of Gujarat despite an initial rejection of the campus plans.

AAI’s plea ignored

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) had sought more land from the Gujarat government for the extension of the Ahmedabad airport runway, first in 2013 and then again in 2018.

In 2018, the AAI requested 29.79 acres of land to extend the safety area of the runway after a detailed audit report of the safety of the airport.

“The application from the AAI had come in May 2018, seeking allotment of about 30 acres of land that would cross into the Meghaninagar slum. The application stated they needed the land to extend the runway and build a parallel taxiway to alleviate traffic congestion. The application is still pending with the department,” an official from Ahmedabad Urban Development Authority (AUDA), pleading anonymity, told The Federal.

Nod to Medicity

Interestingly, while the AAI application remains pending, the application for the Medicity Project, of which BJ Medical College is a part, was approved by the AUDA.

“The application for a new residential complex for BJ Medical and Civil Hospital first came to AUDA in 2011 as a part of the Medicity Project but it was rejected given its proximity to the airport and height of the proposed 13 buildings as per the Comprehensive General Development Control Regulations (CGDCR) of Gujarat laid down by the Town Planning and Valuation Department. However, in 2013, the application was reissued and approved within seven days. By the end of 2014 the first phase of the project was almost complete,” added the official.

The Civil Medicity Project was first proposed in 2010 by the Modi-led BJP government with an initial budget of Rs 588 crore. The initial plan included an expansion and modernisation of the civil hospital campus, equipping the hospital with over 2,000 beds.

The project also included a 900-bed general hospital, a 500-bed infectious disease hospital, a new hostel for the UN Mehta Institute of Cardiology and Research Centre, BJ Medical College and new residential staff quarters for senior doctors of BJ Medical College and Civil Hospital.

In June 2015, the residential complex was among an array of structures inaugurated by Modi when he visited his home state as prime minister.

Extension of project

At the same time, Modi announced that the project would be extended with additional funds from the Central government, taking the revised budget of the project to a whopping Rs 3,460 crore.

A 10-storey building is currently under construction near the old building of the Civil Hospital as per the extended Medicity Project that is located at a distance of around 7 km from the SVP Airport.

The new building is for a hospital featuring a parking capacity of over 1,500 vehicles, a separate OPD for infectious diseases, an operation theatre and 115 beds.

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In October 2022, Modi once again inaugurated new buildings of his pet project Civil Medicity – a new complex for the night stay for relatives of patients.

So far, a total of 35 projects worth Rs 2,590 crore have been completed within the Medicity campus located between Meghaninagar and Asarwa area of Ahmedabad at a distance of 5 to 10 km from the airport.

In December 2024, Gujarat Health Minister Rushikesh Patel held a review meeting for the Medicity Project. “The construction work of the development of Civil Medicity, which is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s dream, is nearing completion. All the medical and super-specialist services which will be available in Civil Medicity will be better than other hospitals in the state and the country,” he said.

What do guidelines say?

As per the Urban and Regional Development Plans Formulation and Implementation (URDPFI) guidelines, which the state urban planning bodies refer to for allocating land and construction of infrastructure, the buffer zone of any airport that is 20 km radius of any airport must have very low intensity of development and population, and should not contain wildlife, sanctuaries or zoos.

As per the URDPFI, any construction higher than 20 metres in the airport funnel (critical) area requires AAI approval.

Significantly, the new residential complex of the BJ Medical College and Civil Hospital that was impacted in the crash has 12 four-storey buildings – Atulyam (1 to 12) and one three-storey building for an undergraduate hostel that violates the regulations of the URDPFI.

It also violates the Aircraft (Security) Amendment Rules 2024 of the Ministry of Civil Aviation that regulate the height of buildings around airports to ensure aircraft safety.

Runway violations

As per the rules, there can’t be any construction within 150 metres of runways. The height of the building around the airport can increase with distance. A 1 metre increase in height is allowed for every 7 metre distance from the runway, except for take-off and landing paths where it is 1 metre increase for every 20 metres.

“The prima facie investigation into the recent crash in Ahmedabad has revealed that the runway of the SVP International Airport extends into densely populated residential areas. The two runways of the international airport complex, 2-3, that is used for take-off and runway 7 that is used for landing, both lack buffer zones and arrestor beds,” said an official of DGCA who was in Ahmedabad following the crash.

“A runway buffer zone or a Runway Safety Area (RSA) is a designated area surrounding a runway that has to be free of obstructions so that the aircraft has that buffer space to land in case of emergency either during take-off or landing. To put it simply, the buffer zone provides an extra space after the runway that provides any aircraft space to crossover or undercross the runway or veer off towards the side during emergency situations. This is especially helpful during bad weather conditions and an aircraft has to side land owing to heavy wind speed. The RSA is also the area where arrestor beds or arrestor system made of crushable concrete are constructed to stop an aircraft that overruns a runway,” he explained.

Trail of destruction

The Air India crash caused immense damage to the BJ Medical College campus. The plane’s front end tore into the Atulyam-11 building while the middle section of the aircraft broke into pieces and scattered across the Meghaninagar slum. The tail and the landing gear pierced into the dining hall of BJ Medical hostel. The buildings Atulyam 2, 3 and 4, adjacent to the undergraduate hostel were also impacted by the fire that spread at a rapid pace, prompting the authorities to vacate the 13 buildings that served as residential quarters of doctors and families of BJ Medical College and Civil Hospital.

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The Ghodasar Circle of Ahmedabad West area, or what is locally called the ‘old city’, comprises the Meghaninagar slum, the hostel of the BJ Medical College and residential quarters of the civil hospital that is just 6 km from the airport and lies in the path of runway 2-3 on side and runway 7 on its other end.

Among the other important establishments in the area are the Military Ammunition Depot, headquarters of Special Task Force (STF), Ahmedabad, and the new oxygen tank unit of the civil hospital, all within 5 to 7 km of the airport.