V. Thulasidas, CMD of Air India

HYDERABAD: Air India, which has received the go-ahead from the Public Investment Board for purchase of 68 aircraft from Boeing at an estimated cost of Rs. 35,000 crores, will negotiate price reduction and delivery of all the wide-bodied jets by 2010.

Cabinet approval is expected in three or four weeks and the purchase order will be placed in November, Chairman and Managing Director V. Thulasidas said in an interview to The Hindu here on Saturday.

State-of-the-art amenities

Negotiations were on with Boeing and the first delivery of the "short haul" range was likely by the last quarter of 2006 and of the wide-bodied aircraft in early 2007. "These will have state-of-the-art amenities, including in-flight entertainment and Internet connectivity, like any other modern aircraft."

The national carrier would also negotiate, as part of a "setoff clause," using part of the money for establishing a joint venture between Air-India and Boeing to set up a Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul facility and a pilot training centre.

"They are favourably inclined", Mr. Thulasidas said. Describing as "unprecedented" the approval to buy 68 aircraft in one-go, he said this kind of expansion had never taken place. Fifty of the aircraft would be wide-bodied and the remaining Boeing 737-800 W for the airline's subsidiary, Air-India Express.

No new aircraft had been purchased since 1996 and only three B737-800 planes were taken on dry lease.

With this expansion, aimed at meeting the requirement and make up for the "lack of growth" in the past 10 years, Air-India would get back its status as one of the world's premier airliners, he said.

The airline was planning to operate to new destinations in the United States, including San Francisco, Washington and Houston, as also to Australia, South Africa and Mauritius.

Maintenance facilities

Air-India was planning to create maintenance facilities in Thiruvananthapauram (for short haul aircraft), New Delhi and either in Chennai and Bangalore or Hyderabad.

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