An Empowered Group of Ministers (GoM) will meet Airbus officials on September 6 and try to renegotiate the price of 43 aircraft for Indian Airlines (IA). The negotiations for the Rs 10,000-crore deal were conducted by IA. A committee was appointed to oversee this.But with some MPs objecting that IA settled the deal for much higher than what Air Asia, a South-East Asian carrier, was willing to accept, the Civil Aviation Minister asked IA to seek a clarification from Airbus. The Empowered Group of Ministers — headed by Finance Minister P. Chidambaram — was formed as the Finance Ministry wanted to renegotiate the deal. However, the European aircraft manufacturer had said that the configuration that Air Asia chose was cheaper.It refused to divulge details, citing confidentiality pact with the buyer.
