When George V visited what was then the jewel of his empire back in 1911, a stone archway was built at the landing dock in (then) Bombay for him to pass through and receive a welcome from his 250 million loyal subjects. Fast forward about a hundred years, and the new T3 at Delhi airport is fast on its way to becoming a powerful symbol of a nation that continues to push forward to its rightful place in the world - with the occasional hiccup or stumble, but no longer looking backwards. Airports have long touted themselves as the gateway to the region that they serve - T3 can perhaps look to make itself the Dubai or Singapore of South Asia, with ever growing numbers of tourists and business people.
When I arrived at Delhi back in 1982 after 3 years in Nigeria, the airport at that time was nothing more than a small building with no walkways, just buses that brought passengers in from the tarmac. Of course, back then, it was still called Palam airport, after the village near which it had been built (interestingly, the Brussels airport is referred to as "Zaventem", which is apparently also the name of the village close by!) This was at a time when 707s were still ruling the skies, with the odd 747 thrown in for long haul flights. Air India was actually regarded as one of the better airlines in the world, especially for unaccompanied minors, which is how I had been despatched from Lagos via Nairobi.
Move ahead about a decade, and work finally began on a new terminal at the airport, which had since been named Indira Gandhi International (IGI). The new terminal 2 actually had fingers to take you on board the plane, seating area for passengers and a whopping 12 gates! Since it catered only to international flights, however, the terminal was rarely used during the day, as most flights left between the hours of 10 pm - 4 am. Domestic flights still left out of Terminal 1, and by this time, Indian Airlines had started getting some competition in the form of Jet, Sahara, Damania, ModiLuft, Jagson and East-west airlines. The big attraction of Terminal 2 was the giant departures board with the moving letters and numbers that created a staccato of sound every time a flight left and the whole board updated itself. It also had the flashing green lights that indicated when it was time to go to the gate for boarding.
As air traffic grew, however, Terminal 2 began to show signs that it would not be able to handle the needs of the 21st century. Even a half hearted attempt to put in a duty free shop or coffee/tea stands could not prevent the inevitable - that something had to change. By now, Air India was but a ghost of its former self, a sad state of affairs for what is still the flag carrier for the nation (a comparison with British Airways and Singapore Airlines is too far fetched to even contemplate) - it had also "merged" with Indian Airlines, perhaps the first example of two state entities doing so anywhere in the world. The plethora of carriers that existed in the mid 1990s gave way to just two dominant players - Jet and Kingfisher, with a few low cost carriers thrown in to provide some more choices to the flying public, which was getting increasingly sophisticated in terms of what it wanted from an airline. Unlike the US, where vast distances assure the airlines of passengers, so that customer service is practically unheard of, airlines in India (and most of Asia for that matter) place a high premium on good customer service. Move over, Singapore girl - enter, Kingfisher kudi!
The Commonwealth games were a good enough reason to embark on building T3, and certainly its inauguration was planned to ensure that athletes and tourists arriving for the games got to see this shining example of Indian greatness - but, in reality, T3 is just another brick in the wall of India's development, that includes the national highways and the Delhi metro amongst others. It would have happened anyway, and the fact that it has happened is cause enough to cheer.
My first reaction in getting into the terminal building at T3 was "Wow". The terminal seemed to stretch to infinity and was totally empty, so the sense of space was tremendous. The walk to the immigration counter took almost 15 minutes, and subsequently I read that this was causing a lot of problems as people were just not used to walking that much. This can either lead to a healthier population in general, or an increase in wheelchair requests. The immigration area itself was huge, but somehow we can never seem to grasp the idea of having people queue up in one long line and then go to a counter in succession. Instead, there are separate lines for each of the 30 or more counters, so you're bound to have some amount of swapping that can lead to disruptions. There was a separate line for PIO/OCI, but I regretted joining it, as you had families with kids who were pulling out one passport at a time and showing it to the officer, who was taking his own time stamping the passports.
The immigration counter is where you find the "giant hands" - wall mountings of 10 ft high hands in various poses presumably taken from Bharatnatyam mudras. I'm sure there is some hidden funda here, but it looks a little odd if you stare at it for a while. Past the immigration, you go through a duty free shop (a little odd, as you typically buy duty free when *leaving* a country vs when entering!), and then into the vast baggage claim area. The environment is clean and spacious, and that itself is the biggest improvement from the past - T3 is truly bigger than the current capacity thrown at it, so it will be useful for some years to come, instead of being outdated as soon as it opened. There are 27 gates, more than double that of Terminal 2.
Negatives - carpeting in the gate area - that too somewhat plush. It is unimaginable how someone could allow this to happen, as you can bet that this is going to fray and fade in a few years, and become a replacement nightmare. Somehow we have this belief that carpeting is "western" and so should be used - but that's true of houses, not a public building like an airport. Good quality tile/marble would have been more than enough, in fact that's what every other airport around the world uses.
Another ding is on the airport layout - shaped like a V, with the immigration/customs at the vertex, the transit time within the airport can be substantial if you happen to arrive at either of the top ends of the V. In the security screening, there are two lines for men and only one for women, which (similar to restrooms) results in a long line of women waiting to be screened. A swap is all that's required - have two women's lines.
Of course, the T3 story is still evolving - at some point in the not too distant future, the Metro service will whisk passengers straight to Connaught place from where they can travel around the rest of the city. The roads to and from the airport are still being sorted out, and some of the paint work isn't quite complete as yet. But the airport is still standing, which hopefully means it is in for the long haul. The problem with infrastructure in India has typically been the lack of long term planning - facilities are not designed with longevity in mind, as labor is cheap and repairing something is often easier than putting the extra effort upfront. In the case of T3, one hopes that it is in good shape for at least 10-20 years. Who knows - by that time, people might actually want to start
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