Kolkata: A 136-year-old mosque inside the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International (NSCBI) Airport in Kolkata that has been holding up major technical upgrades is likely to be relocated soon, thanks to the new government in power in West Bengal.
The mosque is situated deep inside the high-security operational area of the airport and the administrative and aviation authorities have now launched a coordinated push to resolve the decades-old deadlock over its relocation, as reported by News18.
Officials from the Airports Authority of India (AAI) and the North 24 Parganas district administration are said to have carried out a joint inspection of the 136-year-old Gouripur Jame Masjid, also locally known as the Bankra Mosque. This on-site assessment was immediately followed by a high-level meeting at the district magistrate’s office, where state officials and airport representatives formally presented the urgent operational necessity for relocation to the mosque committee members.
Officials said that this is a unique case where the airport came around the mosque. There were no problems initially with airport not being as busy as it is today. Structural and logistical challenges for Kolkata’s air traffic management began to surface a few decades ago.
The place of worship stands nearly 150 metres inside the airport’s boundary wall and just 165 metres north of the secondary runway. This violates standard global aviation safety protocols, which strictly dictate that no permanent civilian building should exist within 240 metres of an active runway.
As the structure is located directly within the flight approach path, aviation authorities were previously forced to shift the secondary runway’s touchdown point southward by 88 metres. While the remaining 2,832 metres of the runway are perfectly adequate for standard narrow-body aircraft like the Airbus A320 or Boeing 737, the shortened distance prevents the airport from safely operating wide-body international aircraft like the Boeing 787 or Airbus A330 on this secondary strip.
The secondary runway also lacks the advanced Instrument Landing Systems (ILS) used on the primary runway to facilitate safe flights during heavily foggy winter mornings, as the equipment cannot be safely installed due to the mosque’s proximity.
The civil aviation ministry has been taking up the matter with the state administration for over four decades now. The proposal has been to relocate the structure to a larger, dedicated plot outside the perimeter wall.
Subsequent governments under Jyoti Basu, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, and Mamata Banerjee, paid no heed, citing local religious sensitivities. With the new government in power, the state administration has now aligned directly with the Centre’s infrastructure modernisation goals.
While airport officials are highly optimistic about a breakthrough, the actual relocation process has been mutually deferred until after the upcoming Eid-uz-Zuha festival to ensure absolute community harmony.
“A relocated structure will be beneficial for all. At only about 10-25 local residents are permitted to offer prayers five times a day, with the count rising to nearly 80 on Fridays. The namazis must undergo thorough screening by the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) at a dedicated gate on Jessore Road before being bussed directly across a high-security path to the mosque and back. All this will end once the mosque is relocated,” an official said.
Mosque committee representatives have expressed deep cooperation, noting they do not wish to hinder the airport’s growth or international safety standards.
They have, however, requested that authorities formalise the relocation consensus by consulting major national Muslim umbrella organisations, including the Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind and the All India Muslim Personal Law Board. Detailed discussions to finalise an alternative site and construction blueprint are reportedly slated to resume next week.
