Originally Posted by CTPLAAT

History lesson :-) The airfield on Willingdon Island is actually a naval airfield. In the days before Nedumbassery (the current location for COK), the naval airfield was also used for civilian air traffic. One of the big drawbacks to that airfield was lack of growth opportunities, and ops being limited to 737 classics due to various reasons not least of which was the height of obstacles such as the shipyard cranes.

Bottom line is this - even though the naval airbase does not see civilian air traffic, there is still significant activity. See -> http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/NAVY/INS-Garuda.html