Tanvi Sinha
Supreme Court on March 8th to hear Kerala Government’s plea against Airport Authority of India’s decision to lease out Thiruvananthapuram International Airport to Adani Enterprises.
A three-judge bench of CJI SA Bobde, Justice AS Bopanna and Justice V Ramasubramanian will be hearing the matter on Monday, March the 8th.
Kerala HC had earlier on 19th October 2020, with a division bench of Justices K. Vinod Chandran and C.S. Dias rejected the centre’s plea that challenged the Union Government’s decision to lease the airport to Adani Enterprises Ltd.
Kerala government alleged that the Request for Proposal seemed to be built such as to benefit private parties only and to instead consider a Special purpose Vehicle (SPV) formed by the state government, but the court rejected this contention.
The centre had disagreed with this, stating that the procedure was to be done in a fair and transparent manner with special advantage to be given to KSIDC considering the state governments’ request.
The Centre claims to have made the move in the interest of the airport alone, with the Adani enterprises also stating that the state government or the KSIDC had simply no authority to lay any claim or contention on the transfer of that property.
Read also: Kerala HC dismisses state’s plea against airport lease to Adani group