Dis Ministry to rope in IOC, ONGC & GAIL

new delhi: disinvestment ministry is believed to have sought divestment of government equity in navratna oil psus -- indian oil, oil and natural gas corporation and gas authority of india and will approach cabinet committee on disinvestment with a proposal soon. a proposal for referring these three oil majors to disinvestment commission may come up for discussion at the next meeting of ccd on feburary five, sources said. taking the cue from government's oil policy as enumerated in the 'hydrocarbon vision 2025' that government would continue to have atleast 51 per cent equity in the three oil companies, the disinvestment ministry has now favoured minority sale of equity in the these corporations. the government had earlier decided that ioc, ongc and gail would be its flagship companies under its management in downstream oil marketing and refining, upstream oil exploration and gas marketing respectively as part of the strategy for ensuring oil security in the wake of freeing marketing of petroleum products in the country from april 1, 2002. government currently has 84.10 per cent holding in ongc, 82.02 per cent in ioc and 67.34 per cent in gail, sources said while pointing out that there was enough scope for bringing down government equity while maintaining management control. disinvestment ministry is believed to have made a proposal suggesting that the three companies be referred to reconstitued disinvestment commission for suggesting modalities for disinvestment. as part of attaining disinvestment target in 1999-2000, the government had sold 10 per cent of its equity in ioc to ongc and vice versa, a decision which was supported on the ground that it would bring about a synergy in the operations of the two oil giants. cross holding of equity was also resorted in case of gail and ioc. besides the proposal to refer ioc, ongc, gail to disinvestment commission, the ccd meeting on february 5 would also finalise the strategic partner for telecom company vsnl and petro product retailer ibp, sources said. while government is divesting 33.58 per cent stake in ibp, it is selling 25 per cent stake in vsnl to a strategic partner. a decision on recommending the three corporations was deferred at an earlier meeting of ccd due to non-availability of petroleum minister ram naik, sources said. during the last meeting of ccd on january 16, disinvestment minister arun shourie had announced referring additional non-strategic psus to the disinvestment commission for recommending process of government equity sale. while petroleum product retailer ibp has already been put on block, government holding in oil refining and marketing companies hindustan petroleum corporation and bharat petroleum corporation is likely to be diluted to a minority holding and management control transferred.

Dis Ministry to rope in IOC, ONGC & GAIL

NEW DELHI: Disinvestment Ministry is believed to have sought divestment of Government equity in navratna oil PSUs -- Indian Oil, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation and Gas Authority of India.

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