Indian Hotels Company Ltd (IHCL), owner of the Taj Group of hotels, on Friday agreed to buy the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Boston for $170 million (Rs 765 crore), concluding a transaction for which it had signed a letter of intent recently.

Taj Hotels Resorts and Palaces has signed a share purchase agreement with Millennium Partners, owners of the Boston hotel, IHC said in a notice to the stock exchanges.

Taj Hotels will take over management of the hotel on January 11, 2007 when the property will be renamed the Taj Boston, the company said in a release.

The equity component of the deal will be financed from the company's unutilised FCCB proceeds, Taj Hotels had said at the time of announcement of its half-yearly results for the current fiscal.

The 273-room hotel, set up in 1927, is located on Arlington Street near Boston's Public Gardens.

It is the oldest Ritz-Carlton hotel in continuous operation in the US.

contd on page 2...