Air Sahara wants Jet Airways to buy it for Rs3,020 crore or pay Rs1,931 crore as damages

Mumbai: Air Sahara has filed a Rs3,020 crore claim against Jet Airways for its failed acquisition deal. Sahara has sought a direction from the arbitration tribunal that the Naresh Goyal-promoted Jet Airways should execute the share purchase agreement and close the transaction as per directions of the tribunal.

In its prayer before the arbitration tribunal on November 20, Air Sahara sought Rs3,020 crore from Jet Airways for execution of the share purchase agreement along with recovery of inter-line business revenue that the latter received for nearly three months.

Alternatively, Sahara demanded that if Jet is unwilling to buy it, then the airline should pay over Rs1,931 crore as damages.

Jet Airways, however, filed its claim a day after the deadline set by the tribunal, seeking refund of Rs500 crore paid by it as advance to Air Sahara along with interest.

The panel, headed by British judge Lord Stein, will come out with an order binding on both parties by March 2007. Justice S P Bharucha and Justice B P Jeevan Reddy, both retired judges of the Supreme Court, are on the panel as nominees of Jet and Air Sahara respectively.

Jet Airways is currently busy making up lost ground following its aborted merger with Air Sahara.

Jet Airways remains the largest domestic airline in terms of market share, accounting for 28.3 per cent as of October this year, followed by Indian 19.9 per cent, Air Deccan 18.1 per cent, Air Sahara 9.4 per cent and Kingfisher 9.3 per cent. However, the number of passengers carried by Air Sahara has gone up from 1.92 lakh in June to 2.65 lakh in October.

The number of passengers carried by Jet Airways on a monthly basis has oscillated from 7.83 lakh in July to 7.41 lakh in September before beginning to rise to reach a level of 8 lakh in October.