TajSATS Kitchen at Navi Mumbai Airport Serves 40+ Flights
Navi Mumbai Airport’s TajSATS Kitchen Prepares for Rising Flight Demand
The growth of Navi Mumbai International Airport is bringing a less visible part of air travel into focus: the kitchens that prepare meals for passengers before an aircraft leaves the ground.
The TajSATS flight kitchen at Navi Mumbai International Airport (NMIA) is currently serving more than 40 departing flights each day. It can prepare up to 7,500 meals a day, with the ability to increase production to 15,000 meals as airline operations and passenger numbers rise.
The facility is located inside the airport premises and caters to both domestic and international airlines. Its timing is significant as NMIA prepares for the Winter Schedule 2026-27, which runs from October 25, 2026, to March 27, 2027.
For passengers, the kitchen may be out of sight. For airlines, it is part of the basic ground operation needed to run flights on time and serve passengers properly.
Subhash Murikenchery, Chief Airport Officer, Navi Mumbai International Airport, said: “As NMIA expands its airline network, it is important that our supporting infrastructure grows with it. The TajSATS flight kitchen gives airlines the flexibility to meet rising demand and enhances the culinary experience for passengers.”
The kitchen is designed around the changing needs of airline schedules. Food has to be prepared, chilled, stored and moved to aircraft within tightly managed time periods. Having the production facility within the airport precinct reduces the distance between the kitchen and departing aircraft.
This becomes more relevant as Navi Mumbai develops its role in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region’s aviation network. NMIA was planned as a second major airport for the region, with an initial passenger capacity of 20 million passengers a year. Its wider development plan provides for further expansion as traffic grows.
The airport is already handling scheduled passenger services. Its current airline listings include IndiGo, Air India Express and Akasa Air, with both domestic and international operations listed at the terminal.
The arrival of more flights creates demand for a range of support services. Catering is one of them, alongside baggage handling, aircraft cleaning, fuelling, ground transport and other airport operations.
TajSATS has been involved in airline catering in India for more than four decades. The company is a joint venture between Indian Hotels Company Limited, part of the Tata Group, and Singapore-based SATS. It operates catering kitchens at several Indian airports, including Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA). The company says it produces more than 150,000 meals a day across its operations and serves more than 40 domestic and international airlines.
The Navi Mumbai facility also gives international airlines another option for what is known in the industry as local meal uplift. This allows meals to be loaded at the airport from which a flight departs instead of relying entirely on catering prepared at another airport.
The airport’s announcement says around 40 per cent of international carriers operating from India rely on back catering from their own flight kitchens. The new facility is intended to support that requirement as well as the needs of domestic airlines.
Food requirements can vary widely between flights and passengers. The kitchen is equipped to prepare special meals, including allergen-sensitive and halal options. Its operations are also subject to food safety requirements covering preparation, handling, refrigeration, storage and dispatch.
The facility follows standards and requirements including Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP), ISO 22000 and Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) rules.
The scale planned for the kitchen also gives an indication of how airport demand may change. Its present capacity of 7,500 meals a day could double to 15,000. The figure does not mean that all 15,000 meals are being produced today. Rather, it gives airlines and airport operators room to increase catering output when flight movements and passenger traffic require it.
That capacity question is important for NMIA because its development is taking place alongside major changes at Mumbai’s existing airport.
Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport is preparing for redevelopment work at Terminal 1. The changes are expected to affect flight schedules during the coming winter period, with airlines and airport authorities working through the allocation of services between the two Mumbai airports. Recent reports have pointed to reductions in some international departures from CSMIA during the redevelopment period.
Against this backdrop, the availability of airport-based services at NMIA becomes a practical issue. Airlines moving or adding services need more than gates and runways. They also need catering, passenger facilities, aircraft servicing and other ground support to operate those flights.
The TajSATS kitchen is therefore one part of the wider infrastructure being put in place around the airport’s expanding operations. It handles more than 40 departing flights a day, with production capacity to take on a larger schedule.
For travellers, the most visible sign of NMIA’s growth will remain the number of flights, destinations and airlines available from the airport. Behind each departure, however, is a chain of services that must work within minutes and strict safety rules.
Food is one of those services. As Navi Mumbai International Airport enters another busy winter flying season, preparing thousands of airline meals close to the aircraft will become part of the airport’s day-to-day capacity test.
