Gail signs ₹2,000 crore loan agreement with SBI
State-owned gas utility GAIL India on Tuesday said it has borrowed ₹2,000 crore loan from State Bank of India (SBI) to meet its general capital expenditure requirement. The loan is for a 15-year tenure, the company said in a statement without saying what interest rate it would pay on the borrowing. GAIL said it signed with SBI “a rupee term loan agreement of ₹2,000 crore having a door-to-door tenure of 15 years. The purpose of the loan is for general capital expenditure of GAIL, mainly in the gas pipeline projects, in the forthcoming years.” The pact was signed in the presence of GAIL director (finance) Subir Purkayastha and SBI general manager S K Pradhan.
COMPILED FROM AGENCIES
Giving more time, the government has extended the deadline to May 31 for submission of expressions of interest (EoIs) with respect to Air India disinvestment.
Besides, the qualified interested bidders would be intimated on June 15. In March, the government said the last date for submission of EoIs would be May 14 and that the qualified interested bidders would be known on May 28. Now, these deadlines have been extended, according to an official communication.
On March 28, the government unveiled plans to sell up to 76% stake in loss-making Air India and transfer the management control to private players.
Profit-making Air India Express and joint venture AISATS—an equal joint venture between the national carrier and Singapore-based SATS Ltd— would also be part of the disinvestment process.
In a corrigendum to the global invitation issued for EoIs for Air India stake sale on March 28, the civil aviation ministry has also tweaked certain conditions.
As per the preliminary information memorandum, till the time the government has shareholding in the company, the confirmed selected bidder shall carry on the business of companies on a going-concern basis and on an arms length basis from its other business. Now, this requirement would be subject to the condition that the “confirmed selected bidder shall be allowed to realise operational synergies subject to applicable law with further details being in RFP (Request for Proposal)”, as per the corrigendum.
Further, the ministry has provided more clarity with respect to bidding by consortium and sole bidder. In case of a sole bidder forming a consortium, then that entity would be the lead member and any change would be permitted only once after the EoI deadline.
The sole bidder would also be barred from shifting from one consortium to another. The requirements are also applicable for consortiums participating in the bidding process.
India could see several cross-border joint ventures in defence and aviation thanks to changes in regulations, access to new technologies, need for local partners, and a growing industrial base for aviation and defence, Deloitte’s 2018 global aerospace and defence industry outlook said.
Citing a recent International Air Transport Association study, the report also stated that India could become the world’s third largest aviation market by 2025, a year earlier than originally expected. India will also drive growth in the commercial aircraft segment in South Asia region, which is expected to witness over 8% passenger traffic growth annually, over the next two decades. “The country is forecasted to have a demand for a record 2,100 new aircraft, worth US$290 billion, with the majority of these being single aisle planes,” Alaric Diniz, director, Deloitte India said.
“The demand will primarily support the growth of low-cost carriers, which account for more than 60.0% of the total flights in the country,” Diniz added.
The report, authored by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Ltd’s global aerospace and defence leader Robin S Lineberger and Deloitte US Center for Industry Insights’ aerospace and defence leader Aijaz Hussain, stated that the growth in aviation and defence in India is aided by various policies executed by the government during the last two years.
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