Mumbai: Mumbai airport will not cut any international flights (time slots) during this winter schedule, which runs from Oct 25 till March-end, its operator said on Tuesday. Passengers booked on international flights to or from Mumbai airport this winter can breathe easy; their flights will not be cancelled or moved to Navi Mumbai airport.The decision defused a standoff over Mumbai airport operator’s plan to cut a third of international departures this winter to make room at its terminal 2 (T2) for domestic flights displaced by terminal 1 (T1) redevelopment, which was set to begin mid-Jan next year. A Mumbai International Airport Ltd (MIAL) spokesperson said that airlines have committed to support the redevelopment of T1, with “traffic balancing” to begin from the summer schedule. The summer schedule runs from around March 27 to Oct 31 next year, so some international flights scheduled to depart from/arrive at Mumbai airport in summer could be cancelled or moved to Navi Mumbai airport.The decision to not disturb the winter flights came following a meeting of Mumbai airport’s airline operators’ committee (AOC) with Adani Airport Holdings Ltd (AAHL) which runs Mumbai and Navi Mumbai airports. AAHL director Jeet Adani and its CEO Arun Bansal have assured the airline community of minimal disruption and full respect for historical slot allocations, said the MIAL spokesperson. “They have further given a commitment not to disturb any slots for the winter schedule,” the spokesperson added.According to MIAL, a joint working group will take two weeks to draw up an implementation plan for redeveloping the ageing Mumbai airport T1, which handles about 15 million domestic passengers per annum. With regard to possible “traffic balancing” in the summer schedule, MIAL said it has assured full support to any airline that wants to shift operations to Navi Mumbai airport. Both sides will meet again on Oct 28 and, until then, engage with each airline’s network and slot teams. There was no word on the possible new timelines for T1’s phase-wise demolition.The meeting followed intervention by the ministry of civil aviation on Oct 3. The row began with MIAL’s Oct 1 letter to airlines, which proposed temporarily cutting 265 of 770 weekly international departure slots from Oct 25. The cut would have hit 46 Indian and foreign carriers and removed about 38 international departures a day. It would have freed up space at Mumbai airport T2. MIAL said the freed slots and ground infrastructure would serve domestic flights displaced by the partial demolition of T1, which handles only domestic traffic. Phased redevelopment of T1 was set to begin on Jan 15, with one-third of the terminal building to be demolished, which would have displaced 5 million domestic passengers per annum. After airlines protested, the ministry called a meeting of stakeholders on Oct 3, deferred MIAL’s Oct 26 deadline and asked both sides to return to the negotiating table.