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ONGC Stake Sale Process to Conclude this Fiscal

  • Department of Disinvestment will work out the details as the EGoM favours auction routeOil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) is hopeful that its stake divestment process will be completed before the end of the current fiscal.
  • ONGC Chairman and Managing Director Sudhir Vasudeva said the Department of Disinvestment would work out the details as the Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) favoured auction route for divestment as it was appropriate and based on the new Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) guidelines. “This will take mush less time compared to book building and other processes,” he said. Mr. Vasudeva's statement assumes significance as the EGoM, at its meeting on Wednesday, failed to reach a consensus on selling the government's stake in the corporation. Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister S. Jaipal Reddy said the government was considering auction route, but no timeline had been fixed yet. The EGoM would meet again shortly,” Mr. Jaipal Reddy had said.
  • The government decided to divest about 5 per cent out of the 74.1 per cent stake it holds in ONGC and the proceeds would work out to Rs.11,000-12,000 crore given the current price band. The disinvestment involved sale of 4.55 crore shares and “ONGC is not going to gain anything from the sale,” Mr. Vasudeva said. He was here in connection with the three-day 9 biennial international conference and exposition on petroleum and geo-physics. He said ONGC planned an outlay of Rs.33,065 crore during the next fiscal in line with its expenditure of Rs.1.64-lakh crore during the XII Plan. ONGC ended up spending Rs.1.25-lakh crore, as against Rs.75,000 crore envisaged in the XI Plan.

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