Published Aug 04, 2026 | 12:58 PM ⚊ Updated Aug 04, 2026 | 1:05 PM
PM Narendra Modi inaugurates Bhogapuram International Airport
Synopsis: At the inauguration of India’s newest international airport at Bhogapuram in Andhra Pradesh, Prime Minister Narendra Modi stated that it was his NDA government that put a stop to airports being named after a family. It was an indirect swipe at the Congress’ first family. But is the Prime Minister right? How many of our airports are named after the Gandhis and Nehru?
The inauguration of the Alluri Sitarama Raju International Airport at Bhogapuram in Andhra Pradesh on August 1 saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi launch another attack on the Gandhi family.
The PM claimed that all airports were named after one family earlier and it needed the NDA to come to power in 2014 to change that.
“We named the airport in Ayodhya after Valmiki and the one in Punjab after Sant Ravidas. The NDA government has decided that this new airport will be named after Alluri Sitarama Raju (the famed Telugu guerrilla warrior who fought the British),” he said.
Do facts bear the PM out? South First decided to check.
The first civilian airport in India was the Juhu Aerodrome, which was commissioned in 1928. With the British in power, we can gloss over the absence of the Gandhi name there.
Kolkata’s Dum Dum airport had opened earlier in 1924, but was not recognised as a full-fledged airport and used primarily for refuelling and stopovers by long-distance flights. KLM Airlines had scheduled stops for its pioneering long-distance Amsterdam to Jakarta (then known as Batavia) flights. The airport also saw the first night landing of an aircraft in India when one of the flights from Amsterdam was guided down to the runway on November 14, 1924, with the help of torchlights.
Next came the Safdarjung Airport in Delhi that began operations in 1929. During British rule, it was known as the Willingdon Airfield after a former Viceroy and Governor-General of India. Once India gained Independence in 1947, it was named after Safdarjung, a Nawab whose tomb was erected in 1754 and stands near the airport. Again, no mention of a Gandhi or Nehru anywhere, is there?
Then came South India’s earliest airports—in Chennai and Hyderabad.
Commissioned in 1930, the Chennai airport began life as the Madras International Airport and was later renamed as the Chennai International Airport. Its two terminals are also named after two of the legendary Chief Ministers of the state, with the domestic terminal being called the K Kamaraj terminal and the international one being known as the Anna terminal, after CN Annadurai.
The first airport in Hyderabad came up in Begumpet and was known as the Begumpet Airport. Built by the Nizam of Hyderabad, its foundation stone was laid by Princess Dürrüşehvar Sultan, his wife. Once the Begumpet Airport began to struggle with rising passenger traffic, it made way for the bigger and better-equipped Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Shamshabad, inaugurated on March 14, 2008, with the Congress-led YS Rajasekhar Reddy government in power.
This airport in Telangana’s capital city, which was named after the slain former Indian PM, was probably on PM Modi’s mind when he targeted the Congress’ first family in his attack before a largely Telugu audience.
The only other airport that is named after a member of the Gandhi family is in New Delhi.
Palam Airport was known as RAF Palam when it opened in 1943. It was in 1962 that commercial flights were shifted to Palam Airport from Safdarjung Airport. Twenty-four years later, after the inauguration of the international terminal at the airport, it was renamed on May 2, 1986, as the Indira Gandhi International Airport by the Rajiv Gandhi-led government that had assumed power after his mother’s assassination in 1984.
Interestingly, none of India’s currently 166 operational airports is named after our first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
This at a time when we have airports named after India’s first Deputy Prime Minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel in Ahmedabad, after the second Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri in Varanasi, after Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose in Kolkata, Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar in Nagpur and Jay Prakash Narayan in Patna.
There are no airports named after the Father of our Nation, Mahatma Gandhi, either.
At a time when Narendra Modi has the world’s largest stadium by seating capacity against his name at Motera in Gujarat’s Ahmedabad, shouldn’t he consider naming one or two of the upcoming airports after the names of these two great Indians? It could also lend statements on airports being named after a single family more teeth. For now, two airports out of 166 is a poor definition of all airports, even for those who give a wide berth to rhetorical flourishes.
Also Read:
Finally, take-off time: The story behind the Bhogapuram International Airport
Bhogapuram Airport: Taking North Andhra to new heights
(Edited by R Rajesh Kumar.)
