Realty major Ansal Properties & Infrastructure is understood to be planning to raise up to Rs 400 crore through institutional placement of shares within the next 15-20 days, mainly to reduce its debt.
The company will issue fresh shares and is currently talking to "three big domestic and global institutional investors" for the fund raising exercise, sources said.
Repeated calls and SMSes sent to the company spokesperson remained unanswered.
"The company will issue fresh shares to raise Rs 350-400 crore and if everything goes well, it will happen in the next 15-20 days. With fresh issue of shares, the promoters' holding will come down to about 45 per cent from the existing 56 per cent," a source said.
In May, the company's board had approved an enabling resolution to raise Rs 1,000 crore through the qualified institutional placement (QIP) route.
"With this tranche of QIP raising, the company expects to reduce substantial amount of debt and operate in a healthy mode," another source in the know of the development said.
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The company currently has a total debt of about Rs 1,750 crore.
Earlier, Ansal API had said that the proposed QIP is aimed at raising capital to fund a host of new and ambitious projects being planned by the company. These projects are expected to be launched over the next 12-24 months period.
The company had announced to invest Rs 1,500 crore over the next three years to develop a premium township in Gurgaon and two commercial complexes in Lucknow.
The National Capital-based realty firm currently has about 19 township projects spread over five major states in Northern India under various stages of implementation.
The scrip of the company today fell 0.90 per cent and closed at Rs 93.45 a share on the Bombay Stock Exchange.
Ansal API has reported a nearly four fold jump in its consolidated net profit at Rs 38.79 crore for the quarter ended June 30 compared to Rs 10.21 crore in the same quarter of last fiscal.
The total income rose by 90 per cent at Rs 274.45 crore during the first quarter of the current fiscal as against Rs 144.78 crore in the year-ago period.