The government has pegged its target for disinvestment for FY 2021-22 at Rs 1.75 lakh crore. A major announcement made by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman was that the government will privatise two public sector banks other than IDBI Bank. One general insurance company will also be privatised in the coming fiscal, she said.
“A number of transactions namely BPCL, Air India, Shipping Corporation of India, Container Corporation of India, IDBI Bank, BEML, Pawan Hans, Neelachal Ispat Nigam limited among others would be completed in 2021-22. Other than IDBI Bank, we propose to take up the privatisation of two Public Sector Banks and one General Insurance company in the year 2021-22. This would require legislative amendments and I propose to introduce the amendments in this Session itself,” the Finance Minister said in her speech on Monday.
Presenting the Union Budget for FY22, Sitharaman also exuded confidence that all the announced privatisation decisions will be completed in the next fiscal, despite the massive delay so far and the impact of the pandemic. Thereby, she assured that the much-delayed disinvestment processes of Air India and BPCL among others would be completed in the upcoming fiscal.
She also said that legislative amendments required for LIC IPO would be brought in 2021-22.
Sitharaman added that under the Atmanirbhar Bharat package, a policy of strategic disinvestment had been approved. “The policy provides a clear roadmap for disinvestment in all nonstrategic and strategic sectors. We have kept four areas that are strategic where bare minimum Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs) will be maintained and rest privatized. In the remaining sectors all CPSEs will be privatized.”
The disinvestment target for the current fiscal is Rs 2.10 lakh crore while the revenue collected through disinvestment is only Rs 19,499 crore.
Centre's disinvestment process has been severely impacted both by pandemic along with lack of interest among market players even before the pandemic. Sitharaman also said that NITI Aayog has been asked to work on next list of central public sector companies for strategic disinvestment.
To monetise lands owned by CPSEs, a special purpose vehicle (SPV) would be developed and an Asset Monetisation Pipeline will also be launched.
(with IANS inputs)