The new government that presents the full Budget for 2024-2025 in July should be ready to restructure the way divestment is managed and implemented, proposes A K Bhattacharya.
The government on Friday received financial bids for the strategic disinvestment of IDBI Bank, the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (Dipam) said in an official statement on X.
India's privatisation push, once projected as a cornerstone of economic reform, has suffered another setback, with the Centre set to call off the IDBI Bank stake sale, highlighting the political and structural constraints shaping the country's disinvestment policy, experts say.
'Global uncertainty is something which definitely occupies the minds of officials when we are preparing for the Budget.'
New Delhi will substantially reduce tariffs on industrial and agricultural goods while continuing to protect sensitive sectors. Tariffs on some agricultural products that are not traditionally considered sensitive will be brought down to zero, while in the case of relatively sensitive items, duties will be reduced in a graded manner and quotas will be imposed.
'These children possess catastrophically low birth weights -- often 1.4 kgs or less. Such extremely low birth weight results in profoundly compromised neo-natal immunity.' 'The escalation to 97 deaths in three months precipitated contemporary attention precisely because this magnitude concentrates the humanitarian emergency, rendering it impossible for the administrative machinery to ignore.'
This will be the first full-year Budget of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance government since it came to power for a third consecutive term in July last year.
Steel Minister Ram Vilas Paswan on Thursday ruled out any divestment in the companies under the ministry and said the department had not received any letter from the finance ministry over the issue.
Seasoned bureaucrat and a stickler for rules Finance Secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey will be at the helm of capital market regulator, Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), for three years. The 1987-batch Odisha-cadre Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, Pandey, would replace Madhabi Puri Buch, whose three-year term ends on Friday.
Ahead of the Budget, the government has achieved almost half the divestment target of Rs 65,000 crore. FY23 divestment receipts are unlikely to be anywhere close to the budgeted target.
Presently, the list that we have of profit-making PSUs for divestment is based on financial numbers from 20007-08.
'The Budget needs to focus more on social welfare schemes.'
The government had proposed to raise Rs 30,000 crore from divestment in the current fiscal.
The finance minister continues to be backed by the same policy team in charting out the broad strategy as in the few earlier Budgets.
The Divestment Department in the Finance Ministry has invited Request for Proposals for book running lead managers for the issues.
SAIL on Friday said the finance ministry has given its in-principle approval for 20 per cent disinvestment of the steel giant.
The company has already received the coal ministry's nod to reduce the face value of its shares to Rs 10 from Rs 1,000 at present.
This is not her first stint in North Block or in leading a major economic ministry. She started Prime Minister Narendra Modi's first term as minister of state for finance, was made the commerce minister, and then became the defence minister.
After the government sought Parliament's nod for a second batch of supplementary demand for grants that will cause a hit of Rs 2.99 trillion to the exchequer, doubts suddenly arose about the government's ability to meet the Budget projections of reining in its fiscal deficit at 6.8 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), or Rs 15.06 trillion, for the current financial year. Till now, many were of the opinion that the government would succeed in checking the deficit at a much lower figure than what was given in the Budget Estimates (BE). The government had sought Parliament's approval to spend Rs 3.74 trillion extra, but Rs 74,517.01 crore will be matched by equal savings on other heads.
The Department of Disinvestment, which is looking at mopping up Rs 40,000 crore (Rs 400 billion) from the sale of shares in public sector units this fiscal, has raised about Rs 1,325 crore (Rs 13.25 billion) so far.
Taking forward the drive to sell stake in state-owned firms, the Finance Ministry has asked the Ministry of Steel to divest about 10 per cent of its stake in RINL within next two years and list the firm on bourses or else the PSU's status of Navratna will be withdrawn.
The government has merged the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) with the finance ministry to give it a better control over state-owned firms and facilitate its ambitious privatisation programme. Finance ministry will now have six departments while DPE's hereto parent ministry, the ministry of heavy industries and public enterprises will now be called the ministry of heavy industries. Previously, the disinvestment ministry - created under the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government - was merged with the finance ministry and is now a department under it. Also, Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) was abolished and administration of foreign investments was given to the finance ministry (FinMin).
The government on Wednesday asked ministries and departments to clear dues of debt-laden Air India immediately and henceforth purchase tickets only in cash. The government earlier this month decided to sell Air India to Talace Pvt Ltd, a unit of the holding company of salt-to-software conglomerate Tata group, for Rs 18,000 crore. The Department of Expenditure, under the Finance Ministry, in a 2009 order, had said that in cases of air travel (both domestic and international), including LTC where the Government of India bears the cost of air passage, the officials may travel only by Air India.
The finance ministry is in favour of extending the August deadline for public sector banks (PSBs) as well as insurance companies to increase their minimum public shareholding (MPS) to the mandated 25 per cent, said a senior government official. "The election results will determine the course of action. "Most likely, those who did not receive an extension to meet the minimum shareholding norm will be granted one," the senior government official said.
The government is keen to divest stake in PSU firms .
The guidelines for strategic disinvestment were issued on Monday itself when Finance Minister Arun Jaitley presented the Union Budget for 2016-17.
Doubts over implementation of a Cabinet-approved strategic sale policy are puzzling.
The government cleared the proposal despite opposition from the petroleum ministry, which says this is not the right time for divestment as the sector is moving from trade parity to export parity pricing.
Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar was given the finance and planning portfolio on Friday, nearly two weeks after he broke away from the original party and took oath as Maharashtra's deputy chief minister.
There is money to buy the central public sector enterprises, but buyers will need a firm assurance that the disvestment programme will keep environment issues front and centre of their corporate plans.
Investor confidence has evaporated amid fears over the rising cost of funding India's gaping current account deficit, prompting New Delhi to delay plans to raise much-needed funds through partial privatisations, finance ministry sources said.
Government is expected to rely more on divestment proceeds to keep the fiscal deficit in check
'We are in a position to start due diligence and private data room access shortly.'
Coming Wednesday, Finance Minister (FM) Nirmala Sitharaman will present the 2023 Union Budget - the last full Budget ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. While India exited 2022 as a relatively bright spot in the global economy, the FM will endeavour to present a Budget that insulates India's economy against global headwinds and recession in advanced economies, while sticking to the path of fiscal consolidation. In this, she is being helped by her core team of trusted advisors.
The Ministry of Finance may seek the Union Cabinet's approval for the proposed 10 per cent stake sale in state-owned Coal India Ltd by the end of this month, a senior Coal Ministry official said
This will encompass the sale of Air India, a number of other privatisation initiatives, mergers, initial public offerings, the Centre's two exchange-traded funds, buybacks and offers-for-sale, and even monetisation of land assets.
Failure to sell Air India, IDBI may have prompted a change in strategy.
The Department of Disinvestment in the Finance Ministry will hire an advertising or public relation agency for the purpose.
For first time in 8 yrs, stake sale proceeds could exceed Budget Estimates. ONGC's acquisition of HPCL alone could get the exchequer more than Rs 30,000 crore.
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