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• The Supreme Court has declined to entertain a plea seeking directions to the Centre for a time-bound decision on renaming the Navi Mumbai International Airport after Lokneta D B Patil.
• The bench observed that naming an airport falls within the domain of government policy and not judicial intervention, while granting liberty to petitioners to approach the competent authority.
• The petition challenged a previous Bombay High Court order that had dismissed a similar plea linked to the airport naming issue.
• The Maharashtra government had earlier proposed the name ‘Lokneta D B Patil Navi Mumbai International Airport’, though the Centre has not issued any official notification so far.
• The matter remains politically and socially significant in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region, where local organisations and project-affected communities have continued to demand the airport be named after D B Patil.
The Supreme Court has refused to entertain a plea seeking directions to the Centre to take a time-bound decision on the Maharashtra government’s proposal to rename the Navi Mumbai International Airport after Lokneta D B Patil. The matter was heard in the past week by a bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi, which observed that naming an airport was a policy matter falling outside judicial intervention. Advertisement
The plea had challenged a November 2025 order of the Bombay High Court that dismissed a similar petition seeking a directive to the Centre regarding the naming proposal. During the hearing, the Supreme Court questioned whether deciding the name of an airport was within the court’s function and remarked that such decisions belonged to the executive domain.
According to reports, the petitioner organisation had sought a direction to the Union government to take a decision within a fixed timeline on the Maharashtra government’s proposal to rename the airport as ‘Lokneta D B Patil Navi Mumbai International Airport’. The bench, while declining to intervene, granted liberty to the petitioner to pursue the matter before the competent authority through administrative channels.
The court also observed during the proceedings that while citizens have the right to protest in a democracy, such protests should not create inconvenience for others. The remarks came in the context of submissions referring to ongoing demonstrations and public campaigns linked to the naming demand.
The naming issue has remained sensitive in Navi Mumbai and adjoining regions due to the role played by the late D B Patil in advocating for the rights of project-affected persons and local landowners during the development of Navi Mumbai and associated infrastructure projects. Political parties and local organisations have repeatedly pressed for the airport to bear his name.
The greenfield airport project, developed in Navi Mumbai’s Ulwe area, is one of the largest infrastructure projects in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region and has been developed through a partnership involving CIDCO and private airport operators. The airport commenced commercial operations in late 2025 and has been positioned as the second major aviation hub serving the Mumbai region.
The Maharashtra government had previously forwarded the proposal for renaming the airport to the Centre. However, no final notification or approval regarding the proposed name has yet been issued by the Union government. Local organisations and political groups have continued to seek formal approval for naming the airport after D B Patil, keeping the matter active in public and political discussions across the region.
Source - PTI
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