The Government stake sale in state-owned National Aluminium Company (NAlCO) is likely to be postponed to the forthcoming financial year as the offer for sale (OFS) price for the company's shares is yet to be determined and only three weeks is left for the current fiscal to end.
Official sources said that a meeting of the high-powered committee headed by Disinvestment Secretary Ravi Mathur is scheduled to take place on March 11 which will take a call on the OFS price.
Once this is done then the empowered Group of Ministers (eGoM) would meet to formally okay the price fixed by the Mathur-led panel. This, sources added, would take time and therefore the actual divestment of NAlCO may happen only by April 2013.
Earlier the Government was hoping to wrap up NAlCO stake sale by February 28, 2013 and in fact the road shows too had been conducted between February 4 and 8. However the meeting of the eGoM (which is headed by Finance Minister P Chidambaram), which was earlier scheduled to take place on February 18, could not materialise as the OFS price was not finalised.
The eGoM meeting may now take place within the next 10 days, sources said.
Government plans to divest its 12.15 per cent stake in NAlCO. Currently the Centre holds 87.15 per cent stake in NAlCO, and after its 12.15 share is offloaded, this would be reduced to 75 per cent. It plans to raise Rs1,500 crore through the exercise.
Earlier NAlCO's divestment had to be put off in November 2012 owing to the state-owned company's dismal second quarter results.
In its second quarter, NAlCO had reported a sharp 96.4 per cent drop in its net profit to Rs5 crore for the period ending September 30, 2012 against Rs139 crore in the same quarter of the previous fiscal.
However in a remarkable reversal of fortunes, in its third quarter results for the period ending December 2012, NAlCO registered a net profit of Rs 119 crore, up from Rs51 crore during the corresponding period, which was jump of 133 per cent.
This, sources said, boosted the Government's confidence in NAlCO and even though its divestment may be shifted to the next fiscal, it is keen to go ahead with the stake sale in the aluminium major.
Even Mines Ministry officials had expressed optimism that NAlCO would have a good showing in its third quarter.
So far in this financial year, the Government has raised Rs 21,500 crore against the disinvestment target of Rs30,000 crore. Disinvestment Secretary Ravi Mathur has already said the Government would try to raise Rs 27,000 crore in the current fiscal ending March 2013.
Government has lined up biggies like Coal India ltd (CIl), Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Rashtriya Ispat Nigam ltd (RINl) among others for offloading its stake during 2013-14 and has set up a divestment target of Rs40,000 crore for that fiscal.