The Civil Aviation Ministry has floated a cabinet note for an in-principle nod for stake sale in Bengaluru and Hyderabad airports, sources have told CNBC-TV18. The government aims to sell its stake in the four joint venture metro airports of Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru but the process has been initiated for Bengaluru and Hyderabad first.

The Airports Authority of India holds about a 13 percent stake each in the two airports of Hyderabad and Bengaluru.

“Simultaneously, AAI is also working on appointing an advisor for the evaluation process of the stake sale. This will help in the preliminary understanding of the stake value,” a person aware of the matter said.

Rajiv Gandhi International airport of Hyderabad is owned and operated by GMR Hyderabad International Airport Ltd (GHIAL), a public-private venture. Its stakeholders include the Airports Authority of India (13 percent) and the Government of Telangana (13 percent), as well as a private consortium between GMR Group (63 percent) and Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad (11 percent).

Bengaluru airport currently is a public-private venture with stakeholders including Karnataka State Industrial Investment and Development Corporation (13 percent), Airports Authority of India (13 percent), and 74 percent is held by private companies Fairfax Financial (54 percent) and Siemens Project Ventures (20 percent).

In addition, the Civil Aviation Ministry is also working on a cabinet note for privatization of 13 airports, where six major airports will be clubbed with seven minor airports, people in the know said.

Under the recently announced 6-lakh-crore worth National Monetisation Pipeline, 25 AAI airports have been considered for monetization. The indicative monetization value has been set at Rs 20,782 crore during FY22-25, out of this the government expects Rs 10,000 crore from stake sale in Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bengaluru airports and the remaining Rs 10,782 crore has been considered from the monetisation of 25 AAI airports.

In FY22, the government aims to get private players for Bhubaneswar, Varanasi, Amritsar, Trichy, Indore, and Raipur and for Calicut, Coimbatore, Nagpur, Patna, Madurai, Surat, Ranchi, and Jodhpur in FY23.

(Edited by : Abhishek Jha)

First Published:Sept 24, 2021 2:29 PM IST