The Rs 2,200-crore deal by Jet Airways to buy out Air Sahara remains in uncertain territory, though both sides agreed to extend the agreement by three months on a day marked by closed-door meetings that continued after Jet chief Naresh Goyal left for Mumbai late evening.While the extension of the agreement was expected—the escrow account to drive the deal expires on Friday—speculation centered around the absence of a consensus on a renegotiated price.Sources said that discussions were stuck after Jet offered to renegotiate the deal at a substantially lower price. Sahara, it is believed, is firm on the original price of Rs 2,200 crore.“The meeting is continuing. We have time till midnight,” Mr Goyal told media earlier in the day. Air Sahara CEO Rono Dutta refused to comment while Jet executive director Saroj Dutta was not available on phone.Earlier in the day, Goyal and his team air dashed from Mumbai to Delhi on the penultimate day of the deadline to finalise the deal. Teams of the two airlines kept the media in a tizzy by changing the venues of their meetings. They first met at Maurya Sheraton in south Delhi and later moved to The Oberoi in central Delhi to finalise the “nitty-gritties” of the agreement.There is still no word so far on clearance of Air Sahara’s application to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) for share transfer agreement. Jet Airways has already got the requisite clearance from the Company Affairs Ministry to buy out Air Sahara.
