Government To Conclude Stake Sale In IDBI Bank By End Of 2025, Says DFS Secretary Nagaraju
The Indian government is moving ahead with key asset sale plans, including the IDBI Bank stake sale as part of its broader disinvestment strategy.
The government is working on its stake sale in IDBI Bank and expects it to complete by the end of 2025, said M Nagaraju, Secretary of Department of Financial Services.
"It's on track and the process is on. We will finalise as per the time schedule which will be in this calendar year," Nagaraju told reporters on the sidelines of an event hosted by National Housing Bank.
Earlier on Monday, NDTV Profit exclusively reported that the Indian government is moving ahead with key asset sale plans, including the IDBI Bank stake sale as part of its broader disinvestment strategy for the fiscal, according to Secretary of the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management Arunish Chawla.
When asked about the Supreme Court's judgement that quashed JSW Steel's plan to acquire Bhushan Power and Steel, Nagaraju said that the government has discussed this with banks and is in the process to finalise a response.
"We need to take a serious look at the judgement. I have already reviewed with all the banks. We have taken a position, we have studied the judgement, we have got our advocates' view on the judgment. We will take a view within the government how do we approach the judgement," he said.
On Friday, the Supreme Court held JSW Steel Ltd.'s acquisition of Bhushan Power & Steel Ltd. as illegal and ordered the liquidation of the latter.
It ordered that the resolution plan submitted by JSW Steel in 2019 be rejected. JSW Steel had won the bid to acquire Bhushan Power & Steel under the insolvency and bankruptcy code for a little less than Rs 20,000 crore. It had beaten Tata Group and UK-based Liberty Group to win the asset. The acquisition was later concluded in 2021.
At the time, this was the second largest acquisition under the IBC.
Bhushan Power & Steel was one of the 12 companies shortlisted by the Reserve Bank of India in 2017 for insolvency proceedings. Bhushan Power owed its lenders more than Rs 47,000 crore and over Rs 780 crore to operational creditors at the time.
The unwinding of the insolvency transaction will likely hit major banks including State Bank of India and Punjab National Bank, which led the committee of creditors in the Bhushan Power case.
