No plans to change NIF guidelines: Finmin

NEW DELHI: Ruling out any plans to restructure the National Investment Fund (NIF), the government today said the proceeds from disinvestment of the NHPC and Oil India Limited (OIL) will be credited to the NIF.

"The process of initial public offerings in NHPC Limited and Oil India Limited are already in progress. The receipts from the disinvestment would be channelised into NIF", Minister of State for Finance S S Palanimanickam said in a written reply in the Lok Sabha.

The IPOs of the NHPC and OIL were expected to hit the capital market in August and September respectively, while the disinvestment of other PSUs would be decided on a case by case basis.

Asked whether the government was proposing to amend the NIF guidelines, the Minister in a separate reply said, "no".

Under the existing guidelines, the disinvestment proceeds are deposited in the NIF, which is managed by three public sector mutual funds -- UTI Asset Management Company, SBI Funds Management and LIC Mutual Fund Asset Management Company.

The NIF currently has a corpus of Rs 1,815 crore. It generated an income of Rs 85 crore in the first year, Palanimanickam said.