Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday said the Centre's commitment to privatisation remains as strong as ever and it is just a question of timing when the state-owned companies that are in the pipeline for divestment would be put out.
Sitharaman said preparation time as well as the market performance are two main factors that influence when the divestment proposals are put out. "The process is on for many items," she said in an interview with Rahul Joshi, Group Editor-In-Chief of Network18,
While the Finance Minister did not mention divestment in her Budget speech on Wednesday, she said it is a part of the Budget documents.
She said the Cabinet has taken a call about the companies that have to be privatised. "So we will, of course, have to see when is the best time for it to be done, given the fact that we have already done the homework and kept it ready to put it out in the market. The preparatory time consumes a lot of time. Post that, we watch out for the market and put it out," she said.
Meanwhile, a government official told CNBC-TV18 that the Centre's part sale in Hindustan Zinc as well as other offer-for-sales (OFSs) would help meet the FY23 investment aim of Rs 50,000 crore. The official, however, pointed out that meeting the target is increasingly becoming a challenge.
The FY23 divestment target is pegged at Rs 50,000 crore and the current divestment receipts are at Rs 31,000 crore.
The official said that meeting the FY24 divestment aim of Rs 51,000 crore could be a challenge as the pipeline of minority stake sales are becoming narrow and also there are a lot of externalities involved and the process is cumbersome as well.
The official also said that the Centre may call off the Pawan Hans transaction and a show cause notice has been issued to the winning bidder.
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(Edited by : C H Unnikrishnan)
First Published: Feb 3, 2023 3:53 PM IST
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