In a first, Jet Airways to sell 24% stake in Abu Dhabhi’s Etihad for Rs 2,050 crore

April 25, 2013

Abu_Dhabhis_Etihad

Mumbai, Apr 25: Naresh Goyal's Jet Airways and Abu Dhabi carrier Etihad finally enacted a well choreographed tango, clinching the first foreign direct investment ( FDI) deal after foreign airlines were allowed part- ownership of their Indian rivals.

On Wednesday, the Jet Airways board cleared preferential allotment of shares (at Rs 754 apiece) to Etihad, giving the latter a 24% direct stake in India's second largest airline by market share. Etihad will pay $379 million (about Rs 2,058 crore) for the stake, valuing Jet Airways at $1.57 billion, which is 32% higher than the current market value of the domestic carrier.

Etihad will take two board seats even as Goyal will hold 51% stake and remain non-executive chairman of Jet Airways. The Abu Dhabi airline will separately take majority shares in JetPrivilege, the frequent flyer unit of Jet Airways, for $150 million. It has already paid another $70 million to purchase Jet's slots at London's Heathrow airport.

The deal also has the potential to make Abu Dhabi the biggest emerging hub for Indian globe-trotters. Jet said it would establish a Gulf gateway in Abu Dhabi and expand its global reach through Etihad. "It's a game-changing opportunity for Etihad, and a game-changing opportunity for India," Kapil Kaul, regional head of the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA), told Reuters.

Late in the evening, India and Abu Dhabi governments as part of bilateral pacts agreed to increase the flying rights between the two countries to approximately 50,000 seats per week from the current 13,600 per week.

"This transaction further strengthens the balance sheet of Jet Airways and, more importantly, underpins future revenue streams, which will accelerate our return to sustainable profitability and liquidity," said Jet Airways chairman Naresh Goyal.

Etihad president and chief executive James Hogan added, "It (the deal) is expected to bring immediate revenue growth and cost synergy opportunities, with our initial estimates of a contribution of several hundred million dollars for both airlines over the next five years."

Eithad becomes the first big full service global airline to buy into the India story where travel is expected to triple to 159 million in the next 10 years. Earlier this year, Kuala Lumpur based low cost carrier AirAsia announced a joint venture with Tata Group to float a new airline.

The multi-layered deal-making was a complex affair aided by a battery of law firms—Economic Laws Practice, Gagrats, Amarchand Mangaldas and DLA Piper—and investment banks Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse and HSBC. The transaction is subject to shareholder and regulatory approval, which bankers and lawyers expect to come by in the next three months.

In the first phase, people familiar with the transaction, said that Goyal will sell 5% of Jet Airways through an offer for sale (OFS) to comply with the new 25% public shareholding norms. Currently, public shareholding in Jet Airways stands at 20%. This is being done as Sebi rules require a company to first adhere to public shareholding norms before making a preferential allotment.

Goyal and his family through their holding company Tail Winds hold 80% in Jet currently. The pugnacious Indian aviation entrepreneur founded the airline 21 years ago. It now operates a fleet of 100 aircraft and flies to 73 destinations in India and 20 overseas.

People in the legal circles said that the Goyal family will transfer their interests in Tail Winds, which is an overseas corporate body (OCB) incorporated in Isle of Man, a tax haven to their personal names/entities, which will be the new holding company of Jet. This is being done as OCBs are no longer recognized by the RBI and an OCB can't take fresh positions in equity or debt. However, they added, since Tail Winds was given an exemption, the promoter would check with the banking regulator whether they have to the restructure their holding before the launch of the OFS scheme.

The deal with Etihad will bring in fresh money to Jet that will be used to retire debt, which stands at $2.3 billion. Set up in 2003, Etihad, with a fleet of 70 Airbus and Boeing aircraft, serves 86 cities in West Asia, Africa, Australia, Asia, US and Europe.

"The price is good for Jet. I think Etihad may have paid over the odds slightly, but with Kingfisher out of the picture there is only one full service heavyweight in town, and that's Jet," Sudeep Ghai, partner at consultancy Athena Aviation told Reuters.

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April 16,2020

New Delhi, Apr 16: South Delhi District Magistrate Brij Mohan Mishra on Thursday said that the administration is investigating how the pizza delivery boy contracted the coronavirus.

"In the last 15 days, we discovered houses he had delivered food. We contacted people living in 72 houses and they have been asked to stay in-home quarantine. No symptoms have been seen in people related to him. 

Testing of his roommate has been done and his reports are awaited. The rest of the people don't have any symptoms, they have been placed under institutional quarantine. Those in-home quarantines are also asymptomatic," Mishra said.

"Unless a positive case comes, we feel that transmission has not taken place. The boy told us that he was continuously wearing a mask while delivering the food. We are also finding out how he got infected. We are getting the information about the places he visited for delivery. He was tested on the basis of the doctor's advice. Later, he tested positive," he said.

72 families have to stay in home quarantine in the Malviya Nagar area after the delivery boy tested positive for COVID-19 on Wednesday.
Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain said that 17 other delivery boys linked with the infected person have also been placed under institutional quarantine.

"A pizza delivery boy has been detected with COVID-19 here. 17 other delivery boys linked with him have been placed under institutional quarantine and 72 people have been placed under home quarantine," Jain said.

Food delivery app Zomato said that the staff of the infected person's restaurant has delivered some orders which were placed on its platform.

"We've been made aware today that a restaurant's employee, who has been recently tested positive for COVID-19, had delivered food in the past to a few customers in the Malviya Nagar area in Delhi. All these customers have already been contacted by the govt authorities... We are not sure whether the rider was infected at the time of delivery," the company said in a statement.

Zomato also claimed that colleagues of the delivery boy have tested negative for COVID-19.
"This restaurant had instructed their riders to wear masks and follow strict hygiene to keep customers safe from any unintended mishap.

All co-workers of the said rider have been tested negative. And as a precaution, the restaurant where this rider worked has suspended operations," read the statement.

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News Network
June 12,2020

New Delhi, Jun 12: India's COVID-19 tally on Friday witnessed its highest-ever spike of 10,956 cases, according to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW).

396 deaths have been reported due to the infection during the last 24 hours.

The total number of coronavirus cases in the country now stands at 2,97,535 including 1,41,842 active cases, 1,47,195 cured/discharged/migrated and 8,498 deaths.

COVID-19 cases in Maharashtra continue to soar with the number reaching 97,648. Tamil Nadu's coronavirus count stands at 38,716 while cases in Delhi reached 34,687.

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News Network
January 31,2020

New Delhi, Jan 31: The Supreme Court Friday dismissed the plea filed by one of the four death row convicts in the Nirbhaya gang-rape and murder case, Pawan Gupta, seeking review of its order rejecting his juvenility claim.

The review plea filed earlier in the day was taken up for consideration in-chamber by a bench comprising Justices R Banumathi, Ashok Bhushan and A S Bopanna. 

On January 20, the apex court had rejected the plea by Pawan who had challenged the Delhi High Court's order dismissing his juvenility claim.

Advocate A P Singh, who is representing Pawan in the case, said he filed a petition on his behalf seeking review of the top court's January 20 order on Friday.

While dismissing the plea, the top court had said there was no ground to interfere with the high court order that rejected Pawan's plea and his claim was rightly rejected by the trial court as also the high court.

It had said the matter was raised earlier in the review petition before the apex court which rejected plea of juvenility taken by Pawan and another co-accused Vinay Kumar Sharma and that order has attained finality.

Singh had argued that as per his school leaving certificate, he was a minor at the time of the offence and none of the courts, including trial court and high court, ever considered his documents.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Delhi Police, had said Pawan's claim of juvenility was considered at each and every judicial forum and it will be a travesty of justice if the convict is allowed to raise the claim of juvenility repeatedly and at this point of time.

The trial court on January 17 issued black warrants for the second time for the execution of all the four convicts in the case -- Mukesh Kumar Singh (32), Pawan (25), Vinay (26) and Akshay (31) -- in Tihar jail at 6 am on February 1. Earlier, on January 7, the court had fixed January 22 as the hanging date.

As of now, only Mukesh has exhausted all his legal remedies including the clemency plea which was dismissed by President Ram Nath Kovind on January 17 and the appeal against the rejection was thrown out by the Supreme Court on January 29.

Convict Akshay's curative petition was dismissed by the top court on January 30. Another death row convict Vinay moved mercy plea before President on January 29, which is pending.

Singh has also approached the trial court seeking stay on the execution scheduled on February 1, saying the legal remedies of some of the convicts are yet to be availed.

A 23-year-old paramedic student, referred to as Nirbhaya, was gang-raped and brutally assaulted on the intervening night of December 16-17, 2012, in a moving bus in south Delhi by six people before she was thrown out on the road.

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