India’s aviation ministry will bring airlines and Adani Airports representatives together on Tuesday to confront a problem that has moved from planning document to operational deadline. How to clear capacity at Mumbai’s saturated airport without simply exporting disruption to Navi Mumbai.
The meeting follows a proposal to 'shift or cut' roughly a third of international operations from Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport from October 25. As far as 265 weekly international flights involving 46 airlines. It is not a scheduling adjustment. It raises questions about traffic rights, airport designation, commercial viability and who bears the cost of moving passengers between two airports on opposite sides of Mumbai’s metropolitan region.
The immediate correction is important. Terminal 1 is not closing on October 25. Mumbai International Airport Ltd will begin a phased redevelopment of Terminal 1B from January 2027, starting with its north section. MIAL says 91 percent of passenger traffic will not be affected by that work and that the rebuilt terminal’s capacity will eventually rise by about a third, to 20 million passengers annually. The October pressure point is instead the attempt to create room at Terminal 2 and redistribute international traffic ahead of the redevelopment.
That distinction does not make the dispute smaller. It makes it more direct. The ministry, airport operator and airlines now have to decide whether Mumbai can reduce operations at its existing international hub while Navi Mumbai builds sufficient demand, transport links and airline confidence to take the displaced flights.
One meeting, three powers
The Ministry of Civil Aviation has the strongest policy authority in the room. It controls the broad framework for civil aviation, coordinates with other ministries and regulators and represents India in the bilateral air-services agreements that determine which foreign airlines may fly to India and under what conditions.
MIAL, owned and operated by the Adani Airports group, has control over the airport’s infrastructure, terminal allocation, slot-management processes and the practical ability to accommodate flights at Mumbai. It can say that Terminal 2 lacks sufficient capacity for a given pattern of domestic and international operations. It can coordinate a capacity-reduction plan. It cannot, by itself, rewrite international traffic rights.
Airlines have the commercial power to resist. Indian carriers can decide whether to move a service to Navi Mumbai, cut frequency, consolidate flights or suspend a route if the economics no longer work. Foreign airlines can argue that a change in airport designation affects their bilateral rights and their ability to serve Mumbai’s principal commercial catchment.
The ministry can press them, and airport capacity constraints can make a move unavoidable in practice. But compelling a foreign airline to serve Navi Mumbai rather than Mumbai’s existing airport is more complicated than moving an Indian domestic carrier from Terminal 1 to Terminal 2.
Most bilateral air-services agreements do not grant a foreign airline an unlimited abstract right to fly anywhere in India. They define the cities or airports that each side may serve, often through designated points, capacity provisions, airline designations and conditions agreed by the two governments.
That means the legal answer depends on the wording of each bilateral agreement. If an agreement designates 'Mumbai' as a city rather than naming a specific airport, India may have more room to argue that Navi Mumbai is another airport serving the same metropolitan area. If it specifically identifies Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport or if established schedules and approvals are tied to BOM, a mandatory transfer could require consultation, agreement or amendment.
The most likely result is not a single legal ruling applied to all 46 airlines. It is a negotiation. The ministry may ask airlines to reduce Mumbai frequencies, redeploy some capacity to Navi Mumbai, or move selected operations while preserving their underlying entitlement to serve the Mumbai market. Foreign governments could push back if they believe their designated carrier is losing commercially valuable access to the primary Mumbai airport.
That is why the number “265 flights” matters. It is not simply about terminal gates. It is about access to India’s financial capital and one of the country’s most valuable international markets.
MIAL’s case is likely to be that Mumbai cannot postpone renewal indefinitely. Terminal 1B’s redevelopment is due to start in January, and the operator needs to create capacity and operational flexibility before construction removes parts of the existing terminal from use.
The promise is that the disruption will be temporary and ultimately produce a better airport system. MIAL says the redevelopment will affect only a minority of total passenger traffic and lift Terminal 1 capacity to 20 million passengers annually once complete. But passengers and airlines will judge the plan by the transition, not the projected terminal years from now.
The key question is whether the ministry treats the proposal as a request for cooperation or an airport-capacity directive backed by slot controls. If it is the former, airlines may bargain for incentives, phased moves and slot protections. If it is the latter, the risk is that carriers reduce Mumbai service rather than operate from an airport they believe cannot yet support their network.
This is the first real test of the two-airport Mumbai system. It is not merely a question of where 265 weekly flights land. It is a test of whether the state can rebalance capacity between airports while preserving the international access rights and commercial logic that made Mumbai a global aviation market in the first place.