The Emirates EK385 flight, with 481 passengers on board makes emergency landing at Hyderabad airport

Hyderabad, Oct 23 (IANS) The world's largest airplane Airbus A380 made an emergency landing at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport near here Sunday due to a technical snag, an airport official said.

The Emirates EK385 flight, with 481 passengers on board, was on its way from Bangkok to Dubai. 'The aircraft landed with 481 passengers safely at 3.40 a.m.,' an airport spokesman told IANS.

The pilot cited a technical snag as the reason for making the emergency landing at the airport in Shamshabad, around 20 km from Hyderabad.

The aircraft first approached the Chennai airport but did not get clearance for landing as the runway was busy. The pilot then contacted Air Traffic Control at Shamshabad and got the clearance to land.

The Emirates was making arrangements to accommodate the passengers on its Hyderabad-Dubai flights, including a special flight.

An official said that out of 481 passengers, 80 left for Dubai by regular Emirates flight EK527 Hyderabad-Dubai at 10.20 a.m.

Some passengers will be sent by a special flight at 11.20 a.m. and the remaining by the regular Hyderabad-Dubai flight in the evening.

Airbus engineers from the company's headquarters in Toulouse, France, are rushing to Hyderabad to attend to the technical snag. This is the second time that A380 has landed at Hyderabad.

During the civil aviation exhibition in October 2008, the aircraft had landed at Begumpet Airport, the old airport in the city.

The aircraft, with a seating capacity of 525, then landed at the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport, marking the first landing of the super-jumbo at India's first Code F compliant airport -- equipped to receive larger aircraft.

Kerala Cabinet approves SmartCity pact

Realising a dream project of Kerala, the state Government Wednesday signed an agreement with its Dubai-based promoters on setting up the SmartCity IT project at a 246-acre in Kochi.

The long-pending dispute between the two sides over the land ownership issues concering the project were settled at the talks between Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan and and Ahmed Homaid al Tajir, member of the Supreme Committee for Dubai World Group and Public Holding Group here Wednesday.

As per the agreement, on completion of the master plan, 12 per cent of the total land would be converted from leasehold to freehold rights within the Special Economic Zone. The Government would also exempt the land from registration fee and stamp duty.

The agreement was later approved by the state cabinet, paving the way for the work on the project to start without further delay, Achuthanandan told reporters. He also lauded the services of leading NRI entrepreneur M A Yusafali in bringing the two sides to the negotiating table and working out an mutually acceptable solution.

The SmartCity was envisaged in 2004 by then Congress-led UDF ministry as a major joint venture project which could generate thousands of direct jobs.

The foundation-stone for the project was laid in 2007 by the present LDF Government, but its work ran into problems over the Dubai-based partner TECOM's demand for freehold right over at least 12 per cent of the 246 acres of land acquired for the project.

Having settled the disputes resolved, state government and TECOM would jointly work to get the SEZ approval from the Centre at the earliest. TECOM would develop the entire 246 acres as an IT/ITES sector specific SEZ.

Delayed Smart City project set to to take off in Kochi

The main hurdles which had been holding up the work on Kerala’s dream project for about four years were thrashed out by the state government and Tecom Investments officials here on Wednesday morning.

This followed talks held here between Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan and Ahmed Humaid Al Tayar, governor of Dubai International Financial Centre.

Achuthanandan said that Tecom would be given freehold right on 12 per cent land but within the 246 acres which has been notified as special economic zone. This would mean that the promoters will not have the right to sell the land. Tecom’s insistence on getting the 12 per cent freehold land outside the 246 acres was the main object of disagreement between the two sides for the last three years.

It was the mediatory role played by NRI businessman M A Yusuffali that paved the way for the deal which was being projected by the Opposition UDF as a mascot of the LDF government’s inefficiency.

Kerala woos small investors

Kerala prefers more small investors to a few big ones in a public-private infrastructure company being launched, as a large section of non-resident Keralites have shown willingness to invest in it.
State’s Industries Minister Elamaram Kareem, the chairman of the recently registered Infrastructure Kerala Ltd (InKel), said this message had already been conveyed to the investors at a meeting held in Kochi last week.
“When 26% of the paid-up capital of the company of Rs1bn would be with the government, a minimum of 26% should go to small investors. They could be both non-resident Keralites (NRKs) or people living in Kerala,” he said.
The government has decided to publicise the offer by tapping NRKs through road shows in all Gulf countries, beginning in the second week of April.
“Each share is worth Rs10,000 and the maximum number of shares that a small investor could have is 10. We are limiting this to 10 shares each because we want all people to take part in the development of this company,” said Kareem.
“It has also been agreed that big investors would come in only if we are unable to raise the Rs1bn,” he said.
He added that the state government had informed all Keralite organisations in the Gulf about this offer and they could get in touch with either the State Bank of Travancore or the State Bank of India to subscribe to the shares. The offer opens on April 23 and closes on April 30. “Every person desirous of buying shares can give it in writing to these banks and be served on a first-come-first-serve basis,” Kareem said.
InKel has also identified locations in Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi for setting up basic infrastructure for investors interested in starting sunrise industries. – IANS