Privatisation hurts public, benefits only a handful of cronies, says Rahul Gandhi

NEW DELHI: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday attacked the BJP government over privatisation of airports by commenting on social media: "They don't know how to build but sell." Gandhi tweeted on Monday afternoon: "#IndiaAgainstPrivatisation which hurts the public and benefits only a handful of cronies." Gandhi's attack comes in wake of the government aiming to sell its residual stake in four airports as part of the Rs 2.5 lakh crore asset monetisationpipeline.

The sale of Airport Authority of India's remaining stake in the Delhi Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad airports, as well as identification of 13 more airports for privatisation, has been planned for the next fiscal.

The Ministry of Civil Aviation will take approvals for divestment of equity stake of the AAI in the joint ventures running Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad airports. For the 13 AAI airports identified for privatisation, the possibility of bundling of profitable and non-profitable airports will be looked at to make more attractive packages.

In the first round of airport privatisation under the BJP government last year, the Adani Group bagged contracts for six airports - Lucknow, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Mangaluru, Thiruvananthapuram, and Guwahati. Adani Enterprises in January had signed the concession agreement with the Airports Authority of India (AAI) for operating and developing the Jaipur, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram airports.

In a regulatory filing, the company said that the concession period is 50 years from the commercial operation date. "Adani Jaipur International Airport Ltd, Adani Guwahati International Airport and Adani Thiruvananthapuram International Airport, wholly-owned subsidiaries of the company, have signed the concession agreement on January 19, 2021 with Airports Authority of India for the operations, management and development of Jaipur, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram airports respectively," it said. (IANS)

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