The Indian government has agreed to sell the heavily indebted Air India company to the Tata conglomerate for 180 billion rupees ($ 2.4 billion), the finance ministry said on Friday.
Read alsoTata Group makes an offer to buy the indebted airline Air India
Tuhin Kanta Pandey, head of the government's privatization department, said Talace Pvt Ltd, a subsidiary of the Tata conglomerate, won the tender for the airline. "
The transaction should be concluded by the end of December 2021,
" he said. The tea and steel conglomerate Tata had founded the airline as Tata Air in 1932 before it was nationalized in the 1950s.
In the 1990s, faced with competition from Gulf carriers and low cost airlines on domestic and international routes, Air India began to rack up huge losses and debts.
Successive Indian governments have attempted to privatize the company, but its debts and New Delhi's insistence on retaining a stake have discouraged potential buyers.
Read alsoTata Group makes an offer to buy the indebted airline Air India
Last year, the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which sought to get rid of public assets, decided to accept offers for the entire company, withholding part of the debt.
