Govt's disinvestment kitty set to cross Rs 1 lakh crore mark

NEW DELHI: The government's disinvestment proceeds from all its asset sales till date are set to cross the Rs one lakh crore milestone with its share sale in Power Finance Corp scheduled to hit the market later this week.

The government may garner over Rs 1,100 crore from sale of its 5 per cent stake in PFC through a follow-on public offer (FPO). The process will also involve sale of 15 per cent fresh equity worth over Rs 3,300 crore, scheduled for May 10-13.

The proposed Rs 1,100-crore share sale in PFC would take the gross proceeds for the government from its various disinvestment exercises till date to about Rs 1,00,800 crore.

Currently, the total receipts stands at Rs 99,738.92 crore from the government's various disinvestment programmes, ever since they begun in the financial year 1991-92, as per the data available with the Department of Disinvestment.

PFC would be the first disinvestment for the current financial year 2011-12, while there have been only three fiscals -- 1993-94, 2006-07 and 2008-09 -- with no disinvestment receipts at all into the government coffers.

The government has currently lined up three public sector majors -- ONGC (likely in July), SAIL and Hindustan Copper Ltd -- among its forthcoming disinvestments.

The government has proposed an ambitious disinvestment target of Rs 95,000 crore from sale of shares in public sector companies over next three fiscals, including Rs 40,000 crore in the current fiscal.

This is despite the government not being able to meet its target of Rs 40,000 crore in the last fiscal, when total disinvestment proceeds stood at Rs 22,762.96 crore.

In 2010-11, the government carried out disinvestment in SJVN Ltd (Rs 1062.74 crore), Engineers India Ltd (Rs 959.65 crore), Coal India (Rs 15,199.44 crore), PowerGrid (Rs 3721.17 crore), MOIL (Rs 1,237.51 crore) and SCI (Rs 582.45 crore).

Presenting the budget for the current fiscal, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee had said that he intends to maintain the momentum on disinvestment in 2011-12 by raising Rs 40,000 crore.

Besides, the budget documents projected the disinvestment receipts at Rs 30,000 crore and Rs 25,000 crore in 2012-13 and 2013-14, respectively.

The gross disinvestment proceeds of Rs 99,738.92 crore till date includes Rs 81,673.90 crore through sale of minority shareholding in central public sector enterprises (CPSEs) and Rs 1,317.23 crore through sale of majority shareholding of one CPSE to another such undertaking.

Besides, it includes Rs 6,344.35 crore from strategic sales, Rs 6,398.27 crore from sale of residual shareholding in disinvested CPSEs/companies and Rs 4,005.17 crore from other disinvestment-related transactions.