Kingfisher Villa to go under the hammer today, price Rs 85.3 crore

The 17-lender consortium led by State Bank of India will auction the Kingfisher Villa, the sea-facing plush property once-owned by the beleaguered Vijay Mallya in Goa, on Wednesday.

The reserve price for the property, which once was used by Mallya to host lavish parties, has been set at Rs 85.29 crore. Lenders had taken the possession of the villa in May this year after a protracted legal battle with United Spirits over tenancy rights. The villa was owned by United Breweries Holdings, one of the Mallya group companies and was mortgaged by the now-grounded Kingfisher Airlines to the consortium of banks to obtain loans in 2010. Lenders had opened the villa for inspection to interested bidders in two slots--September 26-27 and October 5-6. In the four days during which the property was thrown open, around half-a-dozen entities had visited the palatial villa. “The response was good. Nearly six to seven parties from the hospitality industry and a media organisation have visited the villa,” a source had earlier said.

SBICap Trustees, which is auctioning the property on behalf of the lenders, said the e-auction will include only the immovable part of the villa and not its movable assets. Mallya owes over `9,000 crore to lenders like SBI, PNB, IDBI Bank, BoB, Allahabad Bank, Federal Bank and Axis Bank, among others.