Air India's turnaround plan gets Bankers' nod

MUMBAI: With Air India announcing plans to become operationally profitable in four years, nearly 20 of its lenders on Friday expressed support to it indicating that they were willing to consider recasting its entire Rs 40,000-crore debt. At a three hour-long meeting here, the airline management made a detailed presentation on the plan saying it has set a target of enhancing revenues by Rs 5,000 crore and slash costs by Rs 4,000 crore per annum.

Air India CMD Arvind Jadhav shared with top executives of banks details of the turnaround plan and the financial re-structuring plan which aims to make the cash-strapped carrier operationally profitable by 2015, senior officials said. The bankers would form "a small group from within the consortium to move forward in this matter" , they said.

The airline is saddled with a debt of about Rs 40,000 crore, of which Rs 18,000 crore is working capital loans taken from a consortium of banks, while the balance Rs 22,000 crore is towards payment of new aircraft ordered . "It was the first meeting that all the lenders had with the AI management. Hopefully, we will have the second meeting in 10 days," Bank of Baroda General Manager Arun Tiwari told reporters .

Source: EconomicTimes