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Haldia Petro says not to have IOC as partner

Haldia Petrochemicals Ltd said on Tuesday it was no longer keen to have the country's largest refiner, Indian Oil Corp, as an equity partner in the debt-laden firm.

"We are taking it now that the IOC chapter is closed," HPL chairman Tarun Das told reporters in Calcutta after a meeting with the chief minister of West Bengal, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee.

In March, the HPL board decided to sell a 26 per cent stake in the company and offer management control to state-run IOC for nearly $100 million.

But the IOC equity buyout had not made much progress since then due to differences between IOC and HPL's owners on what the shareholding of the Soros-Chatterjee Group and West Bengal government would be once Indian Oil comes in.

The Soros-Chatterjee business group and the West Bengal government both own 43 percent of HPL's equity of $240 million, while the Tatas hold the rest. The Tatas have said they want to exit HPL because it does not fit in its business plans.

The $1.2 billion HPL plant, which began commercial production in August, is mainly funded by debt of $960 million, raising concern about its ability to meet its repayment obligations.

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