"Ours Is An Airline That Refuses To Die": SpiceJet Chief On Turnaround Plans

SpiceJet Chairman and Managing Director Ajay Singh spoke to NDTV Profit after the airline's successful fundraise of Rs 3,000 crore.

After its successful turnaround in 2015, SpiceJet is trying to pull off another comeback and its efforts have got a fillip with a successful fundraise of Rs 3,000 crore. The airline's Chairman and Managing Director Ajay Singh said the airline wants to quadruple its current planes in the air from 25 to its 2019 strength of 100 in the next two years. 

In an exclusive interview with NDTV Profit on Friday, Mr Singh also said 150 staff members who were sent on furlough last month will be back on the rolls as SpiceJet expands and that the airline has cleared the pending salaries of its employees as well as its GST dues.

To a question on what the airline's priorities are with the Rs 3,000 crore it has raised, Mr Singh said, "The primary use of the raise is to increase capacity - from the current 25 aircraft back to 100 aircraft in the next two years. We were already a close-to-100 aircraft airline in 2019. Of course, another objective of the raise is to clean up the balance sheet and clear up what is due with our partners who are owed money primarily for the period when the aircraft were not flying during Covid and during the grounding of the MAX (Boeing 737 MAX) aircraft in 2019 and for three years thereupon."