Adani Group’s Navi Mumbai International Airport is in talks with its existing lender, State Bank of India, to finance the second phase of its construction, the airport’s CEO BVJK Sharma told Infralogic today.

The airport’s second terminal will have an annual capacity of 30 million passengers, Sharma said.

He was speaking to Infralogic in Mumbai on the sidelines of the Inter Passenger Terminal Show, hosted by trade shows specialist Media Fusion.

“Detailed project reports are being prepared for the second phase and our in-house teams will work jointly with our architects,” Sharma said, adding that pre-construction works is scheduled to start this October.

The company is already in discussions with SBI and will also explore more options, he said, adding that a cost estimate for the terminal will be finalised once the detailed reports are ready.

Adani Enterprises, the parent company of the group’s airports business, said in 2022 that it had closed INR 127.7bn (USD 1.7bn) of debt for the Navi Mumbai airport with SBI underwriting the entire amount.

At the time, SBI Capital Markets acted as financial advisor to SBI while Saraf & Partners Law Offices was the lender’s legal counsel. Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas was legal advisor to Navi Mumbai International Airport.

Since the time Adani acquired the concession from GVK-owned Mumbai International Airport, the winning bidder for the airport project, it has revised the master plan and increased the original capacity to 90 million passengers annually from 60 million earlier.

The first phase of the airport, with an annual capacity of 20 million passengers, is nearing operations, Sharma said.

Multiple airlines have committed to start from the new facility, beginning with domestic flights, he said.