Air India closed the credit facility

New Delhi. The Finance Ministry has directed all the ministries and all departments of the Central Government to immediately clear the dues of Air India. For this, it has been said in the memorandum issued by the Ministry of Finance that recently the Government of India has sold its stake in Air India and Air India Express to Tata Sons. Air India will be completely handed over to Tata Sons upon completion of the process. At the same time, Air India has stopped the credit facility given to government departments and ministries on the purchase of air tickets.

Air India started this facility for government departments and ministries from the year 2009. During domestic and international travel, officials of government ministries and departments could travel by air at government expense. The government used to pay the air travel ticket cost to Air India later. Air India owes a lot to the Government of India for many years. Now in the memorandum issued after the approval of the Finance Secretary, it has been said that government departments and ministries will not be able to buy credit tickets to travel on Air India. In such a situation, they will have to pay cash to buy tickets for air travel till further orders.

The deal for the sale of Air India has been completely sealed on October 25. The government has signed a share purchase agreement with Tata Sons for the sale of Air India. After this Air India has now become of Tata Sons. The deal also includes the sale of Air India Express and ground handling company AISATS. Tuhin Kant Pandey, Secretary, Department of Investment and Public Asset Management, which manages the government’s stake sale in public sector undertakings, had said after signing the share purchase agreement that the government would partner with Tata Sons for the strategic disinvestment of Air India. The share purchase agreement was signed today.
The government had accepted the bid made by Tata Sons’ unit Tales Private Limited for Air India. In this bid, it was proposed to take the responsibility of Rs 2700 crore cash and the airline’s debt of Rs 15,300 crore. Subsequently, on October 11, 2021, a letter of intent was issued to the Tata Group to confirm the government’s 100 per cent stake sale in Air India Airlines.