Examine how changes in State political leadership can affect the continuity of long-gestation infrastructure projects in India.

Large infrastructure projects in India routinely take a decade or more from conception to commissioning, while State governments change every five years. The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation's project monitoring reports consistently identify delay in land acquisition among the leading causes of time and cost overruns [2] — precisely the stage most exposed to political turnover.

Channels through which leadership change disrupts continuity

• Site and scope reversal: the successor government may abandon a predecessor's chosen location. Chennai's second airport, proposed as a greenfield project at Parandur (Kancheepuram) in 2022, was scrapped in August 2026 by the new State government, which opted instead for a Terminal 5 expansion at the existing Meenambakkam airport by the AAI [1].
• Electoral incentives around displacement: land losers are a concentrated, mobilised constituency; opposition parties absorb their demands and act on them in office. At Parandur, sustained farmer protests over farmland and water bodies preceded the reversal [1].
• State control of the critical input: under the Greenfield Airports Policy, 2008, the Union grants site and in-principle clearance, but the State must propose the site and acquire land [4] — so a State's withdrawal alone can halt a Centre-cleared project.
• Consent and assessment stages as veto points: the RFCTLARR Act, 2013 requires Social Impact Assessment and consent for certain acquisitions [3], giving a new government legitimate statutory grounds to reopen decisions.

Implications

• Sunk costs: compensation already disbursed and land partly acquired yield no asset [1].
• Deferred capacity and investor uncertainty, though brownfield expansion partly substitutes [1].
• Positively, reversal can protect livelihoods, wetlands and food security, correcting weak prior consultation.

Discontinuity is thus less a failure of politics than a symptom of front-loading decisions without genuine community consent. Insulating projects requires early Social Impact Assessment, participatory site selection, livelihood-based rehabilitation beyond cash, and institutionalised Centre–State project agreements. Continuity earned through consent, rather than imposed by executive fiat, best reconciles infrastructure needs with the constitutional promise of livelihood security under Article 21.