New Delhi, Dec 14 (IANS): A Delhi-based company, Kanti Commercials is leading the consortium along with Fragment Nivesh and Enormous Nivesh who have bid along with 209 employees of Air India for the national carrier.

In its expression of interest (EoI) for Air India, Kanti Commercials has said, "We are very much eligible to bid for the disinvestment programme of Air India and have expertise in for turning around sick industrial enterprises into profitable ones".

"For the past many years, we have completed many such acquisitions and achieved great success. We are in touch with a team of professional advisors and specialists who can help us revive sick units into profitable ones", the EoI said.

"Moreover, we are bidding as a consortium of 3 members with the help of a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV). The lead member is Kanti Commercials and other members are Fragment Nivesh and Enormous Nivesh", Sourav Bag, Director, Kanti Commercials said in the EoI with the relevant documents.

A group of 209 Air India employees has submitted an expression of interest in partnership with Kanti Commercials. The bid process is being led by Meenakshi Mallik, Commercial Director, Air India.

Kanti Commercials Private Limited is a Private incorporated on April 1, 2003. It is classified as Non-govt company and is registered at Registrar of Companies, Delhi. Its authorised share capital is Rs 1.3 crore and its paid up capital is Rs 13.54 lakh.

It is involved in other wholesale activity which includes specialised wholesale not covered in any one of the previous categories and wholesale in a variety of goods without any particular specialization.

The directors of Kanti Commercials Private Limited are Sourav Bag and Amit Kumar Joshi.

These Air India employees will be asked to contribute Rs 1 lakh towards the bid.

Meenakshi Mallik had earlier written to Team Members of Air India. "Broadly, the project itself entails participating in a bid process along with all other participants who wish to take charge and ownership of AI and its assets", she said.

"I must stress that ownership of the Company is what we are bidding for and thus, we are negotiating with our financial partner such that our Employee - Management Consortium will collectively own and control 51% (i.e. majority) of our Airline. The financial partner will hold the balance 49% of the Company", she added.

"In order to acquire this 51% of the Company, each of us will have to make a financial contribution towards the total corpus. Due to the support we will receive from our financial partner, while I anticipate that each of us will have to make a contribution of no more INR 1,00,000/-, to bid for the Company, this is a detail which I will be better placed to convey to you all once we have passed the initial stage of the EoI. Until we cross Stage 1 (EOI Stage), no monies are needed to be collected from the employees. Moreover, after successfully completing stage one, we are planning our bid in such a way that no single employee will have to take on a financial risk or contribute more than INR 1,00,000," Mallik said.