IndiGo AGM: Airline looks international for high growth, may opt for A321 XLR

New Delhi, Aug 27 : Despite a slowdown in passenger growth in the domestic aviation industry, IndiGo expects to do well financially and is looking at a growth of 30 percent a year over the next few years, said a senior executive.
Addressing the shareholders during the company’s AGM today, chief executive Ronojoy Dutta added that the airline is also looking at an option to buy A321 XLR to drive its international expansion. Dutta said that much of its growth in the coming years would come from international expansion.
The XLR is the longest range single aisle aircraft from Airbus, which will launch it in 2023.
IndiGo at present has a fleet of 238 aircraft. The country’s largest airline has set up a committee that meets every Tuesday to discuss options for wide-body aircraft.
Dutta said that, for wide-body operations, an airline needs to have a business class. IndiGo, currently, only has single-class aircraft cabin.
No Gangwal, Khanna
As expected, the thinly-attended AGM went off without much of a fuss. Co-founder Rakesh Gangwal was absent. Ss was independent director Anupam Khanna who also raised corporate governance issues at the airline.
While a few of the shareholders questioned Gangwal’s absence, Chairman M Damodaran took a conciliatory stance, indicating that things were on the mend between the two co-founders, Gangwal and Rahul Bhatia.
In a statement on his website, GovernanceIndia, Gangwal, said on the night of August 23 that the company’s board had approved a new related party transaction policy and also closed the ‘loophole’ in the Articles of Association.
Separately, Dutta also added that the related party transactions – among the most contentious issues between the two founders – accounted for less than one per cent of total turnover of IndiGo. The related party transactions between IndiGo and Bhatia’s InterGlobe Enterprises were worth Rs 156 crore, Dutta told the shareholders.
He added that each related party transaction was approved by the audit committee of the board.