No takers for Air India stake sale: Core group to meet next week

Till the last day, transaction advisor EY sounded confident there would be bids

With no bidders showing up even on the last day of submitting expression of interest to buy a controlling stake in Air India on Thursday, the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (Dipam) and the Ministry of Civil Aviation are trying to make sense of the disconnect between the hype created before the deadline and the actual result.

Officials involved in the Air India privatisation process say that till the very last day, before the 5 pm deadline, transaction advisor EY sounded confident that there would be bids. 

Early next week, the core group of secretaries in disinvestment, led by Cabinet Secretary P K Sinha and including Civil Aviation Secretary Rajiv Choubey, DIPAM Secretary Atanu Chakraborty, Law Secretary Suresh Chandra, Finance Secretary Hasmukh Adhia, Commerce Secretary Rita Teotia, and Economic Affairs Secretary Subhash Garg will meet and discuss the further course of action. The group will submit its recommendations to the Group of Ministers on Air India, which will then hold its meeting. The time and date for the GoM’s meeting have not been finalised yet.

“One cannot rule out changes to the EOI. But that decision will be taken by the GoM based on the recommendations of the group of secretaries. There is no precedent for this. So it will require some deliberations,” an official said.

The person said lack of EOIs was an unexpected development. 

“Whatever inputs interested parties and civil aviation provided, those were folded into the EOI. We even diluted the net worth requirements,” the official said, while conceding that the government was always aware of grumblings about it holding onto a 24 per cent stake in the national carrier.