New Delhi: Adani group has sought an extension of the deadline to take possession of three privatised airports in Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Mangalore from the Airport Authority of India (AAI).
Citing disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic in the aviation sector, the company has asked the AAI to invoke the force majeure clause to postpone the payment deadline, sources said.
A force majeure is a common clause in contracts that essentially frees both parties from liability or obligation when an extraordinary event or circumstance beyond the control of the parties, such as war, riots, epidemics or an event described by the legal term act of God (hurricane, flood or earthquake etc.) prevents one or both parties from fulfilling their obligations under the contract.
A senior AAI official said, "Our legal teams are looking into requests from the Adani group and nothing more can be said at this point of time."
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Aviation experts said, "The tender process concluded in February 2019. Adani group had surprised the industry with its aggressive bids. How the coronavirus pandemic is effecting that deal now."
Notably, AAI had bid out six of its airports in 2019 and Adani group had emerged as the highest bidder for all six airports. The company has the right to operate the airports for 50 years but those at Jaipur, Trivandrum and Mangalore are already stuck in litigation and the group has not signed any binding agreement with AAI.
On June 3, credit rating agency ICRA had cautioned that dark clouds will loom over Indian aviation infrastructure industry until September 2020 and recovery will commence in the second half of the financial year.
According to ICRA report, passenger traffic at airports will remain under pressure during April- September of the financial year 2021, with some recovery likely only in October-March of the current financial period with an estimated 45-50% decline in numbers during 2020 -21 (April March).
On May 16, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had announced that the bid process for six more airports in the country under the public-private partnership model will start soon and additional investment by private players in a total of 12 airports will be around Rs 13,000 crore.
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