Khajuraho named India’s top airport despite no flights

Khajuraho Airport has been named India’s top airport despite having no commercial flights for two months.

The ranking comes from the 2026 National Service and Customer Satisfaction Index survey conducted by the Airports Authority of India, which judged airports on passenger facilities, cleanliness, security and service quality rather than flight volume.

Flights at Khajuraho have been suspended through July and August for runway and other technical works, with services set to resume around October.

Before the suspension, the airport ran only two scheduled flights, to Delhi and Varanasi.

Airport director Santosh Singh said the ranking “reflected the hard work of the entire airport staff and the trust of passengers,” noting that the survey was carried out while flights were still active.

He added that commercial services would resume once the runway work was complete.

Bhopal’s Raja Bhoj Airport placed third nationally in the same survey, and Khajuraho had also topped the AAI’s customer satisfaction survey in December 2025.

Local residents have questioned the mismatch between the airport’s top ranking and the complete lack of flights this July and August.

Khajuraho Airport’s runway is 2,286 metres long and 45 metres wide, and its terminal building, inaugurated in January 2016, was constructed at a cost of roughly Rs 90 crore.

Most travellers using the airport are headed to the nearby Khajuraho Group of Monuments, a UNESCO World Heritage Site known for its intricately carved medieval temples.

The Airports Authority of India conducts its National Service and Customer Satisfaction Index survey periodically to benchmark airports on the quality of the passenger experience they offer, independent of how much traffic they handle.

Khajuraho is best known internationally for its UNESCO World Heritage-listed group of temples, and the airport primarily serves tourists visiting the site as well as pilgrims and business travellers to the region.

(Image: Photo by Z thomas, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0)