Rakesh Gangwal, the co-founder of IndiGo, on Thursday sold almost 2.75 per cent of his stake in the airline through block deals on the NSE for Rs 2,005 crore. Gangwal and his family held 36.61 per cent in InterGlobe Aviation, the parent of IndiGo at the end of June. Co-founder Rahul Batia and his family hold 38.17 per cent.

Gangwal and his wife Shobha sold nearly 1.06 crore shares on Thursday in four transactions, at prices ranging from Rs 1,886.47-1901.34 apiece. This marks a discount of at least 5 per cent to the closing price of the IndiGo scrip on Wednesday.

Details of the buyers were not provided by the exchange. The deals led to the shares of the budget airline ending in red. It closed with losses of 2.18 per cent or Rs 43.30 at Rs 1,940.65 on the BSE. When he announced his resignation in February as director, Gangwal said he would pare his holding over the next five years.

The resignation followed the appointment of Bhatia as the managing director for five years. The founders were engaged in a long-running feud with Gangwal raising corporate governance issues in July 2019. It drew to a close in December 2021 when the shareholders voted in favour of a resolution that removed restrictions on share transfer to a third party.

While resigning, Gangwal said he has been a long-term shareholder for more than 15 years. and that its ``only natural to someday think about diversifying one’s holdings. Accordingly, my current intention is to slowly reduce my equity stake in the company over the next five plus years.”

“While new investors should benefit from the potential future growth in the company’s share price, a gradual reduction of my stake should also allow me to benefit from some of the upside. Like any plan, future events may impact my current thinking’’, Gangwal said. At the current market prices, Gangwal’s holding in IndiGo is valued at around Rs 26,500 crore.

The company has a market capitalisation of Rs 74,799.36 crore. During the quarter ended June 30, 2022, IndiGo reported a loss of Rs 1,064 crore, lower than Rs 3,174 crore in the same period of the previous year. Differences between the two promoters had come to the fore in July 2019 after Gangwal wrote a letter to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) seeking its intervention to address corporate governance issues.

He had also raised questions about certain related party transactions (RPTs) between IndiGo and the entities belonging to the InterGlobe group.