A deepening dispute over the proposed relocation of the Bankra mosque — formally the Gauripur Jama Masjid — situated inside Kolkata's Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport has brought aviation safety, heritage claims, and political calculations into sharp conflict. The 136-year-old structure, standing barely 165 metres from the airport's secondary runway, has been flagged by the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) and the Ministry of Civil Aviation as a persistent operational hazard.

How the mosque came to be inside an airport

The mosque was originally constructed in the 1890s when the surrounding area was a quiet rural village. The British established the Dum Dum aerodrome on adjacent land in 1924. During major airport expansions in the 1950s and 1960s, the state acquired surrounding village plots and shifted residential settlements across Jessore Road. The mosque, however, was left untouched — gradually becoming enclosed within the high-security perimeter of a growing international aviation hub.

The aviation and security case for relocation

Aviation authorities have long argued that the mosque's structural position prevents large, wide-body aircraft from executing safe emergency landings when the primary runway is closed, owing to the reduced usable runway length. The structure also reportedly blocks installation of modern Instrument Landing Systems (ILS), meaning heavy winter fog routinely triggers flight delays and disruptions at one of eastern India's busiest airports.

Beyond runway constraints, the security implications are significant. To facilitate prayers, airport agencies were required to screen local worshippers at the outer gate and ferry them by bus directly across active taxiways. Over time, allowing general public access to a high-security sterile zone on the basis of standard local identity documents became, according to officials, an unacceptable breach — particularly given the airport's proximity to an international border.

Decades of political deferral

Successive state administrations — from the Left Front under Jyoti Basu to the All India Trinamool Congress (TMC) under Mamata Banerjee — chose cautious deferral over action. Proposals floated in 1995 and 2002 were quietly shelved, with no ruling party willing to risk allegations of community targeting or localised law-and-order crises. Relocating a century-old mosque carried an acute political risk in West Bengal, where minority sentiment is closely contested at elections.

This institutional paralysis left airport administrators managing a delicate daily compromise for decades, critics argue.

Kolkata's precedent of relocating religious structures

The controversy has surfaced a broader historical pattern. Kolkata has repeatedly relocated or modified religious structures when infrastructure demands required it, regardless of faith. During the expansion of the East-West Metro, two 250-year-old idols — of Lakshmi and Mangalchandi — were relocated multiple times to hotels and apartments before being permanently re-housed this month. During the widening of the Circular Railway along the Hooghly riverbanks, dozens of decades-old temples, ghat shrines, and mazars were reportedly cleared to secure the tracks.

In 2022, the then-TMC government in West Bengal reportedly directed district magistrates of approximately eight districts to remove unauthorised religious structures from public places, with police authorities asked to assist in implementation. In 2024, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee publicly pulled up officials responsible for encroachment on government land, after which the administration acted against illegal occupancy of state-owned tracts.

The political flashpoint

The controversy has intensified following a change in state government, with opponents accusing the ruling party of deploying security concerns as a pretext to justify a move that previous administrations had avoided. Critics argue the technical issue has been converted into a partisan flashpoint. Supporters of the relocation counter that decades of deferral have compromised both aviation safety and national security standards at a major international airport.

With the BCAS and civil aviation ministry's safety flags on record, and the airport's runway expansion plans pressing ahead, the resolution of the Bankra mosque dispute is likely to set a precedent for how India balances religious heritage against infrastructure imperatives at sensitive security installations.