AAI plans to raise Rs 1,500 cr as term loan

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) is looking to raise Rs 1,500 crore as a term loan to fund the capital expenditure in the next fiscal.

The state-owned airports operator, which has a healthy balance sheet, is going in for borrowings for the first time. For 2018-19, the capital expenditure is projected to be around Rs 4,100 crore, compared with Rs 2,500 crore for the current financial year ending on March 31.

The domestic aviation market is witnessing a double-digit growth and to meet the rising demand, infrastructure capacity needs to be ramped up. AAI -- which operates more than 120 airports in different parts of the country -- is scouting for rupee term loans to the tune of Rs 1,500 crore, according to a recent public notice.

“Since we have a healthy balance sheet, we are confident of raising funds at more competitive rates,” AAI Chairman Guruprasad Mohapatra told PTI.

Going forward, he said, most of the projects would be implemented on “60:40 ratio”, which means that 60 per cent would be the debt component and the rest would be equity. “This would allow us to take up more projects, especially at a time when lot more spending is required for the aviation infrastructure,” he said.

For the next three years, AAI plans to make capital expenditure to the tune of Rs 15,000 to 17,000 crore. According to Mohapatra, in the next financial year, AAI would be starting work on new terminal buildings worth around Rs 15,000 crore.

Mega projects of new terminal buildings are to start at Guwahati, Leh, Patna, Tiruchi, Vijayawada, Jabalpur, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Srinagar, Pune, Lucknow, Mangalore, Dehradun and Jaipur. In 2016-17, AAI reported had reported 23 per cent jump in net profit at Rs 3,115 crore.

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