The Centre Wednesday scrapped the privatisation process of SAIL subsidiary Bhadravathi steel plant citing insufficient bidder interest.
“Due to insufficient bidder interest in proceeding further with the transaction, government of India, with the approval of Alternative Mechanism (Empowered Group of Ministers) has decided to annul the EoI and thereby terminating the present transaction,” the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) said.
The Expression of Interest (EoI) for selling SAIL’s 100% stake in Visvesvaraya Iron and Steel Plant (VISP), Bhadravathi, Karnataka, was invited in July 2019. The Cabinet had in October 2016 cleared strategic disinvestment of SAIL’s stake in VISP.
This is the second instance of the government withdrawing the strategic stake sale offer due to insufficient bidder interest.
In May, the government scrapped plans to sell its 53% stake in BPCL, saying majority of the bidders had expressed their inability to participate in the privatisation process due to prevailing conditions in the global energy market.
The government last month scrapped the divestment of Central Electronics Limited following the non-disclosure of litigation by the bidder Nandlan Finance and Leasing Private Ltd.
The government has set a modest disinvestment target of ₹65,000 crore for the current fiscal year. During the current financial year 2022 it has raised ₹24,543.67 crore so far.
