Troubled airline SpiceJet has said that is has reached an out of court settlement with an aircraft lessor over the case involving default on aircraft rentals.

In a regulatory filing, the budget carrier said "SpiceJet Limited has today (March 23, 215) entered into settlement agreement with its lessor Wilmington Trust SP Services (Dublin) Ltd with regard to aircraft operated by company."

The lessor has agreed to withdraw the court proceedings and de-registration process of aircraft subject to the airline meeting the terms of the settlement.

On Monday the airline moved to the Delhi High Court against an order issued by it recently in which the DGCA was directed to de-register six Boeing 737 aircraft given on lease to the carrier by some Irish firms which also includes Wilmington Trust SP Service (Dublin) Ltd.

The carrier looked forward to an urgent hearing of the matter. It said that it will not be able to fly its planes once they are de-registered by Directorate General of Civil Aviation. This is going to affect those who have already booked their plane tickets.

On March 19th, a single judge bench of the High Court had directed the DGCA to de-register six Boeing 737 aircraft given to the carrier.

The Irish firms had moved the court seeking directions to DGCA to de-register the aircraft which were given on release to the airline because despite several representations by the firms, the aviation regulator had not carried out the exercise.

The firms had informed that they sought de-registration of the airplane as their lease with the airline had been terminated owing to the default in payment of lease rents by it.

The court had instructed DGCA to immediately de-register the aircraft saying that the aviation regulator was "mandatorily required to cancel registration" once the creditors fulfilled the conditions prescribed in Aircraft Rules.

The court had said that the petitioner companies had fulfilled the conditions specified in the Rules. Hence, the DGCA had no discretion in the whole issue.

The court had directed DGCA to decide within 2 weeks the companies' plea for export of the airplane out of India and disposed of pleas of the firms.

SpiceJet argued that de-registration will adversely affect public interest.