The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) told the Delhi High Court on Wednesday that due to a technical glitch on its portal, several aircraft lessors of GoFirst were shown their applications for deregistration of aircraft as ‘rejected’.
The aviation regulator said it was not processing such requests following the moratorium on financial obligations and transfer of assets of the troubled airline in view of the insolvency resolution proceedings. Due to the moratorium the lessee is unable to pick up and return the aircraft leased to the carrier.
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Justice Tara Vitasta Ganju asked the counsel for the DGCA as to why different responses were sent to different lessees on the request for possession. There are 7-8 petitions, and each one of them has a different answer. For what?” asked the court.
The court asked the DGCA’s counsel to produce documents in respect of each of the petitioner lessees on Thursday when it would hear further arguments from the aviation regulator.
Earlier, the lessees had told the High Court that the DGCA’s refusal to cancel the registration was “illegal”. The lawyers for the lessors had said that they had approached the DGCA to cancel the registration of their aircraft, but it rejected their pleas. They had said that they have not received any communication from the DGCA, but on checking the status of their applications on the regulator’s website, they found that their requests have been rejected.
Advocate Anjana Gosain, representing the DGCA, said this is done in five working days when the lessee sends a request for cancellation of registration to the regulator. He said that no application has been rejected in this matter. The counsel said that there was a glitch in the portal, which led to the rejection of the applications. He said, “He had applied on the portal on May 4. When they opened on May 12, it showed they were rejected,” he submitted.
Its counsel said that when the DGCA received the moratorium communication, it told the lessees that their applications were not being processed. She said that she will place before the court the complete list of 54 applications, including those of the petitioners and others.
On 10 May, the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) had accepted the voluntary insolvency resolution plea of the airline and appointed Abhilash Lal as IRP to manage the carrier.
Earlier, the NCLT-appointed Interim Resolution Professional (IRP), tasked to manage the crisis-hit GoFirst, had told the High Court that returning the aircraft to the lessors would make the airline “dead”, with no maintenance required. has 7,000 employees. ,
The IRP was responding to a demand by several aircraft lessors of GoFirst to deregister their aircraft from aviation regulator DGCA so that they can take them back from the airline.
The lessees who have approached the High Court are Accipiter Investments Aircraft 2 Ltd, EOS Aviation 12 (Ireland) Ltd, Pembroke Aircraft Leasing 11 Ltd, SMBC Aviation Capital Ltd, SFV Aircraft Holdings IRE 9 DAC Ltd, ACG Aircraft Leasing Ireland Ltd , and DAE SY 22 13 Ireland Designated Activity Company.
On 22 May, the NCLAT upheld the order of the Principal Bench of NCLT at Delhi, which had allowed GoFirst’s plea to initiate voluntary insolvency resolution proceedings and appointed IRP to suspend the company’s board. Several lessors approached the aviation regulator seeking deregistration and repossessing of 45 aircraft that they had leased to the carrier.