NRI offers to buy Great Eastern Hotel

After a number of failed bids to hand over the management and running of West Bengal-owned Great Eastern Hotel, the state government on Friday received a positive response from an NRI businessman who offered to buy the ailing heritage concern.

Indonesia-based hotelier Prasun Mukherjee, who met West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharjee on Friday, told reporters at the state secretariat that he had mooted a proposal to buy the hotel and a formula to 'run it successfully'.

"I am 101 per cent ready to buy Great Eastern Hotel and confident of making a profit," Mukherjee said.

The businessman said he had suggested a voluntary retirement scheme to cut down on the excess staff to bring the hotel back on rails.

Earlier, three bidders willing to revamp the 220-room hotel had been rejected as they were found 'unsuitable' to run the hotel.

Currently, the hotel incurs a loss of about Rs 3 crore (Rs 30 million) annually and the state spends Rs 35 lakh (Rs 3.5 million) a month to run it.

Talks with the French hotel chain Acccor Asia Pacific, which had agreed to invest Rs 100 crore (Rs 1 billion) to change the facilities without changing its heritage facade, also failed recently as the hotel employees' unions were opposed to retrenchment of staff.