Jet Airways announced to temporarily shut down its operations in the month of April five years ago after flying as a full service airline for 25 years. The airline took this step due to cash crunch. Now after the Supreme Court’s order for liquidation of the airline, the possibility of its flying again has completely ended. Since the airline’s operations came to a halt, more than 20,000 jobs have been lost and thousands of crores of rupees of creditors, vendors and passengers have been ‘drowned’ waiting for bankruptcy resolution.
Today the Supreme Court ordered the liquidation of the airline, which formally ended the airline’s chaotic journey and also shattered the hopes of revival. The airline’s last flight S2-3502 departed from Amritsar on April 17, 2019 at around 10.30 pm and landed at Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai at 12.22 am on April 18.
Jet Airways’ budget arm JetLite operated flights with Boeing 737-800 aircraft, which were later leased by budget airline SpiceJet. At the peak of its operations, Jet Airways had more than 120 aircraft. When the airline shut down operations due to mounting debt and non-payment of salaries to employees, it had 16 of its own aircraft. Founded by Naresh Goyal, the airline has served crores of passengers for more than two and a half decades.
Goyal started with travel agency JetAir as a general sales agent for several international airlines. Jet Airways was also one of the major private airlines in the Indian aviation sector, but its downfall began due to financial crisis. The airline started its journey as an air taxi operator with service from Mumbai to Ahmedabad. At its peak, it had about 20,000 employees, including about 1,300 pilots. Jet Airways had more than 20,000 employees when it announced the temporary closure of operations in 2019. At that time, the company owed banks more than Rs 8,500 crore. Apart from this, thousands of crores of rupees of agent and passenger refunds were due.
A few weeks after Jet Airways stopped operations on April 17, 2019, lenders sought the insolvency resolution process to recover their dues. The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) accepted the insolvency petition filed against the airline on June 20, 2019. Jalan Kalrock Consortium (JKC) emerged as the successful bidder for Jet Airways under the insolvency resolution process in 2021, but the resolution plan was shelved as a result of persistent differences with lenders.
The Supreme Court, exercising its extraordinary powers under Article 142 of the Constitution, stayed the insolvency proceedings of the airline, setting aside the order of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT). NCLAT said it had allowed JKC to take over Jet Airways without fully complying with its payment obligations. Apart from liquidation, the apex court has ordered forfeiture of Rs 200 crore put in by successful bidder JKC.
The court also allowed lenders led by SBI to encash a performance bank guarantee of Rs 150 crore. The court accepted the plea of SBI and other lenders against the NCLAT decision. NCLAT had upheld Jet Airways’ resolution plan in favour of JKC. After so many years of the airline being grounded, all that is left is… disrupted livelihoods, non-payment of dues and a few planes bearing the image of Jet Airways gathering dust…
