The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs [CCEA] has taken an in-principle decision to divest 51% of Union Government’s shareholding in Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited [HPCL] – a downstream central public sector undertaking [PSU] – in favor of Oil and Natural Gas Corporation [ONGC] – a PSU in upstream segment. A group of ministers [GOM] under finance minister, Arun Jaitely has been set up to work out the modalities. The merger is expected to be completed within the current year. The decision is a follow-up of the announcement by Jaitley in his budget speech for 2017-18 to create 2 or 3 integrated oil and gas companies by merging existing PSUs which can compete with energy majors in the private sector –...
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Category: PSU reforms & dis-investment
ONGC-HPCL deal – milching in garb of merger
NPAs legacy – offshoot of bureaucrat-borrower-politician nexus
In a brief prepared for the G-20 meeting at Hamburg, the International Monetary Fund [IMF] turned the spotlight on vulnerabilities of the Indian banking sector caused primarily by unsustainable level of non-performing assets [NPAs]. As on December 31, 2016, gross NPAs were about Rs 676,000 crores – 90% of these with public sector banks [PSBs]. The figure will be close to Rs 1000,000 crores if one includes the bad loans given a lease of life via ‘restructuring’ – a euphemism for relaxing payment terms. The problem had been festering for quite some time under United Progressive Alliance [UPA] and assumed monstrous proportions during its second term [2009-2014]. This remained camouflaged until such time the Reserve Bank of India [RBI] initiated...
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Air India – privatization is the way forward
Recently, finance minister, Arun Jaitely in a veiled statement raised a question mark over the desirability of the government continuing to run Air India [AI] with a meager 14% share when private sector occupies an overwhelming 86% of the space. The statement lends credence to a possibility that the recommendation of Niti Aayog for privatization of AI could be taken on board. But, the ministry of civil aviation does not appear to be too enthusiastic about privatization. It has mooted bringing in a ‘strategic’ partner even while retaining majority control. It believes that the government on its own, is capable of turning around if only the airline is unshackled from its huge debt [currently, over Rs 50,000 crores]. Within a...
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SEARCH FOR THE RIGHT SOLUTION
Loan waivers and written-offs given to corporates or farmers are totally unacceptable. They impact viability of banks and erode their capital base In the last session of the Parliament, members of the Opposition alleged that, while the Government had no qualms in waiving loans worth hundreds of thousand crore rupees given to industrialists and corporates, it showed little inclination to extend the same relief to farmers who are unable to pay back loans for no fault of theirs. The treasury benches responded by saying loans given to corporates are not waived; instead, they are written-off. To a layman, write-off and waiver would appear to convey the same meaning — in both, lender decides not to recover unpaid loans from borrower....
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Bad loans – is write-off same as waiver?
During debate in the last session of parliament, Sitaram Yechury [CPM] and other members alleged that while, the government had no qualms in waiving loans worth hundreds of thousand crores given to industrialists/corporate, it showed little inclination to extend the same relief to farmers who are unable to pay back loans for no fault of theirs [courtesy, drought/poor rainfall or untimely rains]. The treasury benches responded saying loans given to corporate are not waived; instead they are written-off. To a layman, write-off and waiver would appear to convey the same meaning i.e. in both, lender decides not to recover the amount from the borrower. Yet, Reserve Bank of India [RBI] and finance ministry would want us to believe that write-off...
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Modi’s surgical strike on NPAs
For an economy that is considered to be the brightest spot on the global platform, a major area of concern is high level of non-performing assets [NPAs] of banks especially public sector banks [PSBs]. As on December 31, 2016, gross NPAs of PSBs were Rs 606,000 crores of which Rs 100,000 crores were added during April-December 2016. For private sector banks, as on December 31, 2016, gross NPAs were Rs 70,321 crore of which about Rs 22,000 crores were added during April-December 2016. Total stressed assets, which comprise gross NPAs as well as restructured standard advances [a euphemism for NPAs given a lease of life by relaxing the terms of payment such as extending repayment tenure, lowering interest rate, conversion...
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Strategic sale of PSUs – to forego, a tactical blunder
In several areas, Modi – government has continued with the policies and programs of the erstwhile UPA – dispensation and has unquestionably bettered upon in implementation and deliverable; for instance, Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Generation Program [MGNREGP] and disbursement of LPG [liquefied petroleum gas] subsidy. Yet, there is one area where the former continues with latter’s legacy with no better outcomes. This has to do with “strategic” disinvestment of Union government’s shares in public sector undertakings [PSUs]. It may be recalled that in its previous incarnation under Vajpayee, the BJP-led NDA dispensation [1998-2004] had vigorously pursued strategic disinvestment, some of high profile cases being Modern Food Limited [MFL], Hindustan Zinc Limited [HZL], Bharat Aluminium Company [BALCO] etc. The UPA...
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A tsunami of NPAs in the making
Even as the public sector banks [PSBs] are struggling to cope with the disastrous consequences of unsustainable high level of non-performing assets [NPAs] [over Rs 600,000 crores on last count] on their balance sheet as also choking flow of credit, political establishments in almost all states as also at the central level are at work to make life even tougher for them. In the just concluded elections in Uttar Pradesh [UP], prime minister Modi promised loan waiver to all small and marginal farmers. The commitment was reiterated in almost every election speech ad infinitum. Now, that BJP has got a resounding mandate with ¾th majority, the state government will have no escape from having to redeem this pledge. This will...
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Royalty liability: milching of ONGC, OIL ends
In an unprecedented move, the government has exonerated its undertakings in the oil sector — Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and Oil India Limited (OIL) from a potential liability of about Rs 22,000 crore in royalty dues to Gujarat and Assam governments. ONGC had to pay Gujarat Rs 8,392 crore and Assam Rs 1,404 crore in royalties for the period April 1, 2008 and January 2014. Together with interest Rs 2,868 crore, the total liability was Rs 12,664 crore. OIL had to pay to Assam Rs 4,902 crore in royalty dues plus Rs 4,355 crore in interest adding to Rs 9257 crore. The Union government has settled this pending liability of ONGC and OIL by paying the royalty amount...
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