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Govt May Look to Wind Up SUUTI This Fiscal Year

  • The government is making one last effort to shore up non-tax revenues. Sources say the government is likely to push through the auction of 5% stake in ONGC and BHEL in the next EGoM on Wednesday. Sources add that the finance ministry may relook at the option to wind up the SUUTI, reports CNBC-TV18's Aakansksha Sethi.On ONGC, the government has been trying to understand the SEBI guidelines. The key decisions, which they have been discussing all these weeks, since the last EGoM took place, include what is the method of allocation- whether it is going to be discretionary proportionate or priority pricing- how is the marketing going to be done and also whether it will be close pricing or open pricing and how the price discovery will be done. So, these were really the questions that the government was looking at after SEBI announced and notified its guidelines.
  • On Wednesday, the EGoM is going to meet and discuss these questions. The government is keen that the ONGC auction atleast should be pushed through this fiscal so that it can get atleast Rs 10,000 crore of the Rs 40,000 crore that it had targeted, considering that direct tax revenues are not going to meet the target. So, ONGC is the key auction that they are looking at.Apart from that, SUUTI was something that they had been considering. It had always been an option on the table. But it had taken a back seat because of the difficulties that the government will face in pushing it through and getting cabinet approval since SUUTI has been as established by an act of parliament. However, now it's being looked at, once again, as a back up option to shore up the fiscal situation. 

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