Air India owes Rs 2,310 crore to oil companies

NEW DELHI: Air India and its subsidiaries owe Rs 2,310 crore to the oil marketing companies, Civil Aviation Minister Vayalar Ravi informed the Lok Sabha today. "Till the end of first fortnight of September, Air India has a total due of Rs 2,310.65 crore, of which the cash strapped national carrier owes Rs 1563.67 crore to Indian oil Corporation, Rs 409.82 crore to Bharat Petroleum Corporation and Rs 337.16 to Hindustan Petroleum Corporation," he said in a written reply. He said that in order to help the national carrier, a Group of Ministers last month agreed to grant a credit period of three months as sought by airlines management. "The credit period, however, was agreed without exempting Air India from payment of interest," the Minister said. Facing liquidity crunch, the national carrier has a debt of Rs 22,000 crore as working capital loan and around Rs 21,000 as aircraft acquisition loans. In reply to a separate question, the Minister said Air India has withdrawn its services from 14 routes, which were not profitable. The routes are Mumbai-Sharjah, Calicut-Doha-Bahrain, Mumbai-Vadodara, Kolkata-Ahmedabad/Jaipur-Kolkata, Hyderabad- Mumbai, Chennai-Calicut, Chennai-Mumbai-Kuwait, Hyderabad- Cochin-Coimbatore-Hyderabad, Kolkata-Hyderabad-Kolkata, Bangalore-Singapore, Chennai-Coimbatore, Mumbai-Nairobi, Chennai-Damman and Kochi-Agatti (which was later reinstated). The Minister also informed the House that due to pilots' strike from April 27 to May 7, Air India has suffered a revenue loss of Rs 200 crore.