Beverages tycoon, Vijay Mallya had great plans for his pet airline project. In 2014, Kingfisher Airlines, in conjunction with its partner United Breweries, had entered into an aircraft leasing agreement with BOC Aviation in Singapore. The contract was for four aircraft. Three were delivered but BOC Aviation refused to deliver the fourth because they had received neither the contractual advance lease payments nor sufficient security deposit.

Eventually the dispute went to the Business and Property Courts of the High Court in London where Justice Picken issued his judgement on February 5th 2018. He awarded BOC Aviation the outstanding lease payments plus interest plus legal costs for a total of 90 million US Dollars. In his judgement, Justice Picken said Kingfisher Airlines and United Breweries had “no real prospect of successfully defending this claim”.

This is a particular set back for Vijay Mallya who is already embroiled in another legal dispute. Recently he was extradited back to the UK to face trial in the Westminster Magistrates Court over other unpaid debts totaling 1.4 billion US Dollars.

Neither Mr Mallya nor Kingfisher Airlines were available for comment.