Air India for sale

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has put the state owned airline Air India up for sale. The Minister of Finance Arun Jaitley has said the government had given an “in-principle” approval for the company, reports the BBC.

Yet the airline, which is saddled with $US8 billion of debt and employs 27,000 staff, is unlikely to be attractive to investors, say market analysts.

IndiGo, the low budget carrier, is reported to be a potential buyer but news of its interest in acquiring a stake in the troubled state carrier sent its shares plummeting by eight per cent according to Bloomberg.

The sale is part of a wider programme of state disinvestments which saw 10 per cent of India coal off loaded to investors in 2015.

The privatisation of Air India would be the first successful state sell-off of an Asian airline since Biman Bangladesh Airlines in 2007.