India militarises highways as emergency landing strips; 20 under construction
Indian Air Force (IAF) is currently constructing/repurposing 20 stretches of national highway as emergency landing strips, with the first just completed in January this year.
This is announced at Barmer by India’s Union Ministers Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari where they inaugurate the first of its kind at Satta-Gandhav stretch of the National Highway 925 on 9th September 2021.
The 2 ministers and the Chief of Defense Staff Bipin Rawat landed in IAF’s Hercules C-130J on the new emergency landing strip in a mock emergency landing. They then witness multiple aircraft operations being carried out on the what the IAF call the emergency landing facility (ELF), including Sukhoi-30MKl fighter, An-32 military transport, the Mi-17 helicopter and other aircrafts.
The entire exercise is to showcase the ELF’s potential to act as an auxiliary military airbase.
This comes after trials on the Uttar Pradesh’s Lucknow-Agra Expressway in October 2017 as proof of concept that fighter jets and transport planes can land on highways in case of emergencies.
After a 19 months construction, supervised by both IAF and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), the 3km ELF stretch of the highway contains a service road that ensures that traffic can continue to flow even when the ELF is under operation, as well as 3 additional helipads (100 x 30 meters each) in 3 separate location in the Rajasthan state.
The other 19 ELF under construction are:
- Phalodi-Jaisalmer road (Rajasthan)
- Barmer-Jaisalmer road (Rajasthan)
- Kharagpur-Balasore road (West Bengal/Odisha)
- Kharagpur-Keonjhar road (West Bengal/Odisha)
- Near Panagarh/KKD (West Bengal)
- Chennai (Tamil Nadu)
- Puducherry road
- Nellore-Ongole road (Andhra Pradesh)
- Ongole-Chilakaluripet road (Andhra Pradesh)
- Mandi Dabwali-Odhan road (Haryana)
- Sangrur (Punjab)
- Bhuj-Naliya road (Gujarat)
- Surat-Baroda road (Gujarat)
- Banihal-Srinagar road (J&K)
- Leh-Nyoma area (J&K)
- Jorhat-Baraghat road (Assam)
- Bagdogra-Hashimara road (Assam)
- Hashimara-Tezpur route (Assam)
- Hashimara-Guwahati road (Assam)
Most of the ELFs are in the border states.
6 of them will be along the western border with Pakistan (Gujarat, Punjab, Rajasthan), with 2 in the highly contested region of Jammu and Kashmir which also borders Pakistan (this however contradict some reports by some Indian media reporting that the Jammu-Kashmir-Ladakh region would get 5 of these ELFs). Tamil Nadu, the state closest to Sri Langka will host 1 of these EFLs. Assam that borders China will host 4, while Bangladesh bordering state of West Bengal will host 3 of them.
For context, the Pakistan bordering Rajasthan state air strip is just 300km from Hyderabad, and would likely give Indian Air Force a significant strategic flexibility in time of crisis.
From the strategic disposition of the ELFs, we can clearly see the threat assessments made by the Indian Armed Forces, with Pakistan clearly seen as a significant threat. Assam hosting 4 of these would also indicate the concerns India have with the increasingly confrontational China. Bangladesh apparently isn’t out of India’s mind as well.
This Barmer airstrip is 3km long, 33 meters wide. Equipped with 2 parking 40 x 180 meters spaces at both ends of the runways for planes to park. Double storey air traffic control tower is built on a plinth measuring 25 x 65 meters, fully equipped with washroom. The service road that will be supporting ongoing traffic during air strip operations is 7 meters wide. This particular 19 months construction project cost around Rs 32.95 crore or 329 million Indian Rupee (4.478 million US dollars).