Ministers to take up airports sale

The empowered group of ministers (EGoM) constituted to look into issues relating to civil aviation, which meets for the first time on Monday, is expected to take up the issue of privatisation and modernisation of the Delhi and Mumbai airports.

The EGoM, headed by Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee, will flesh out the preliminary guidelines regarding the privatisation of the two airports.

Besides, it will also examine whether the government needs to issue fresh global tenders for the privatisation exercise and for appointing the various advisers to the project.

The meeting will also take up issues such as the foreign direct investment (FDI) cap in the aviation sector, besides allowing airlines to participate in the privatisation and modernisation project.

Government sources said the meeting would also devise the modalities required to incorporate the changes in the existing legal structure to allow FDI as well as airlines' participation in the airport privatisation project.

The other members of the EGoM are Finance Minister P Chidambaram, Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel and Law Minister HR Bharadwaj.

Although the initial agenda of the EGoM is only airport privatisation and modernisation, it may also be empowered to take decision on other issues, including the civil aviation policy, fleet acquisition of the state-owned carriers and modernisation of other airports.

According to sources, the EGoM will be able to speed up the decision-making process on important issues and also build a consensus among various allies of the ruling coalition.

Sources also said the various industry representatives, who met the government over the last few days on the civil aviation policy, also favoured the EGoM.

The EGoM was constituted since the decision of the civil aviation ministry to cap the foreign equity component for the privatisation of the Delhi and Mumbai airports at 49 per cent had created problems for the government, with the allies opposing the move.