In Conversation with ASHWINI SULAKHE THORAT: The Visionary Behind the Noida International Airport
Architecture + Design|April 2022
She designs airports for a living! Ashwini Sulakhe Thorat, Lead Architect of Yamuna International Airport Private Limited (YIAPL), is perhaps helming one of the biggest and most complicated projects in the country at the moment.
SEEMA SREEDHARAN
In Conversation with ASHWINI SULAKHE THORAT: The Visionary Behind the Noida International Airport

The foundation stone of the much-publicized Noida International Airport at Jewar in Uttar Pradesh was laid by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in November last year. The airport, sanctioned to be the largest in India, will cater to 12 million passengers upon completion under Phase 1, which will be spread across 1,334 hectares of land.

The scale sounds impossible, yet Ashwini remains unfazed by the seemingly gargantuan task. After all, this is her job. This is what she comes back to every single morning. Ashwini traipses through the barren land with self-assured confidence, educating us about the topographical nuances, the geographical concerns of the greenfield, and how she intends to navigate the airspace. Once Noida International Airport (NIA) becomes operational, the national capital region will have the distinction of hosting two international airports within a 100-kilometre radius. In the past decade, Ashwini has helmed the designs of Bengaluru Airport and the Navi Mumbai Airport.

She has to her credit, airports in Indonesia and Bahrain as well. Ask her what her dream project is and she poses a rhetoric instead, “Well, I've built airports. It's almost like developing a city. Within the airport, I've designed skyscrapers, I've built metros and roadways. What more can I build? My focus is now on building best airport for India!" Here's an excerpt from the rest of our conversation.

FROM ARCHITECTURE TO AVIATION ARCHITECTURE: THE TRAJECTORY

Seema Sreedharan (SS): To start with, I haven't met too many aviation architects. What is aviation architecture? Is it a stream of architecture that you can study? Or is it something that you learn on the job?

This story is from the April 2022 edition of Architecture + Design.

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This story is from the April 2022 edition of Architecture + Design.

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