Vodafone says eager for Essar to be Indian partner

Barcelona, Feb 13: Mobile phone giant Vodafone reiterated on Tuesday it would like India's Essar group to remain a minority shareholder in the Hutchison Essar venture in which it took a majority stake on Sunday.

''I, personally, am very eager for the Essar group to be part of the company in India,'' Vodafone Chief Executive Arun Sarin said at the 3GSM conference here.

Vodafone agreed to buy a 67 percent stake in Hutchison Essar, India's fourth-biggest mobile phone firm, from Hutchison Telecommunications International Ltd for .1 billion.

''It is their (Essar's) choice whether they want to sell out, and in a couple of weeks we'll be making them an offer which is identical to the offer we made to HTIL in terms of price,'' Sarin said.

REUTERS

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