ACG says India 'hurting themselves' over jet recovery dispute

India's fast-growing airline industry faces higher leasing bills unless the country clarifies its insolvency laws, the head of major leasing firm Aviation Capital Group (ACG) said on Wednesday. Foreign lessors, including an Irish subsidiary of U.S.-based ACG, were blocked from recovering jets caught up in the bankruptcy of budget carrier Go First last year and many are still embroiled in a legal battle to recover their assets. India amended its insolvency laws last October to exclude leased aircraft from assets that can be frozen in a bid to address discrepancies between local and global rules, including the 2001 Cape Town Convention. India has ratified but not fully implemented the treaty, which is designed to encourage lessors that control half the world's fleet to rent jets in exchange for a mechanism allowing them to take back relatively easily when airlines default. ACG CE Thomas Baker said lessors were still searching for clarity, despite the Indian government's move. "It's incredibly frustrating. They always find a way to continue to delay the process. The government clarified it in the fall that it (the Cape Town Convention) should apply to existing aircraft but unfortunately, no, no clarity," Baker told Reuters in an interview. "I think it fundamentally impairs the Indian aviation market and they need to fix it. I think it fundamentally changes the way we price risk in that market. They're hurting themselves."<br/>