Kingfisher Airlines has organised the funds to pay overdue salaries to its employees, Chairman Vijay Mallya told the company's staff in an email on Sunday. "I have organised funding so that we can pay your seriously overdue salaries which is a source of great personal sorrow for me," Mallya said.
Employees have not been paid their salaries for months and hundreds of them have left the debt-crippled airline, which has cancelled several flights and grounded more than half its fleet.
Kingfisher Airlines is talking with two foreign carriers about a potential rescue package that could be announced within days, Kingfisher's chairman, Vijay Mallya, said in an interview with a daily newspaper on Monday.
Mallya, the billionaire who controls 58% of Kingfisher, said that he had secured provisional approval from the government for a change in the law that would ease restrictions on foreign ownership of Indian airlines.
He said the foreign airlines, which he did not name, were ready to invest in Kingfisher as soon as a change in the law was announced. The change would allow overseas airlines to own up to 49% of an Indian carrier for the first time.
One of the airlines involved in the talks is International Airlines Group, the owner of British Airways and Iberia, according to an unnamed financial source cited by the newspaper.
Abu Dhabi's flagship carrier, Etihad Airways, has discussed the possibility of a tie-up, which would involve the foreign groups providing equity in exchange for a minority stake, according to the report.
The parties involved could not be reached for immediate comment.