'Vanished From The Books': Air India Sells 40-Year-Old Plane It Didn't Know It Owned

Air India recently completed the extraordinary sale of a four-decade-old Boeing 737-200 aircraft, a transaction made remarkable by the airline's prior unawareness of its ownership. The vintage jet, registered as VT-EHH, had been grounded and forgotten at a remote bay within Kolkata Airport since 2012, only resurfacing on the airline's radar when airport staff flagged its presence and requested its removal.

According to an internal post by Air India CEO Campbell Wilson, the aircraft's omission from official documents stemmed from a series of paperwork quirks during the airline's privatization process. Originally decommissioned for India Post, the Boeing 737-200 effectively vanished from Air India's asset records and collective memory. Its rediscovery prompted a verification process, culminating in its successful sale and transfer, which Wilson described as clearing "another old cobweb from our closet."

The history of VT-EHH reveals its delivery to Indian Airlines in September 1982. It later saw service with Alliance Air in February 1998 before returning to Indian Airlines as a freighter in July 2007. The aircraft officially transferred to Air India in August 2007, following the merger of Indian Airlines with Air India under government ownership. The subsequent acquisition of Air India by the Tata Group in January 2022 further complicated the historical record, contributing to the aircraft's forgotten status until its recent rediscovery and disposal.