The government likely to invite fresh bids for Air India stake sale tomorrow, reports Sindhu Bhattacharya quoting sources.
The government will announce the expression of interest (EoI) tomorrow and it is likely to offer 76 percent stake in Air India, 76 percent in the international arm Air India Express and all of its 50 percent stake in ground handling joint venture AISATS.
As per the broad contours of the plan, the government is likely to offload a majority controlling stake in both the the airlines, and all of its stake in the joint-venture to potential bidders.
However, the government is expected to retain a condition for potential bidders to have a criteria of at least Rs 5000 crore, say sources. This means not a single Indian airline is likely to qualify to bid on its own and might require consortium for the bid.
Sources also say, the government is likely to retain a clause where it expects anybody who wins the bid for the airline to retain its employees for at least one year and then offer a voluntary retirement scheme to the employees.
The entire process is expected to end by December 2018, while the process of approving the bids would likely be over by June.
However, there is no clarity on what happens to the debt, which is around Rs 50,000 crore on books of Air India and reports also say debt could even be Rs 70,000 crore if receivables are taken into account through various other accounting practices.
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