The Supreme Court judgment on the Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) selloffs has thrown into disarray the disinvestment exercise for the current fiscal.
In fact, the government is now considering making legal clearance a pre-requisite for kickstarting the disinvestment process of any public sector undertaking in the future. Senior officials told Business Standard that the next Cabinet Committee on Disinvestment meeting tentatively scheduled for October 3 might consider the proposal that all disinvestment proposals be first cleared by the Attorney General.
Though the government had decided to go ahead with the sale of HPCL and BPCL only after receiving a favourable response from the Attorney General, its plans went awry.
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Maruti, in which the government had given up control in favour of its joint-venture partner and successfully concluded an initial public offering (IPO), was also created by an Act of Parliament.
Even though the Supreme Court judgment would not apply with retrospective effect, a public interest litigation now cannot be ruled out.