WB ready to divest Haldia stake to TCG

In a shift from its earlier stand, the West Bengal government today said that it was ready to exit the prestigious Haldia Petrochemicals in favour of joint venture partner, The Chatterjee Group, as directed by the Company Law Board, but wanted to appoint the valuer of its stake itself.

"We have no objection in divesting our shares (in HPL)," the state Commerce and Industry minister Nirupam Sen said here today. In his first reaction to the CLB order yesterday, Sen had said that the order was "unacceptable" to the state government and it would move court against it.

Sen, however, said that the government has reservations about the order on appointment of valuer and, "we want to appoint the valuer ourselves. We are taking legal opinion on it."

He also said that the government wanted the shares to be divested in a single lot and not in parts. The CLB had directed the state government to divest its 520 million shares in HPL in favour of TCG and that the price payable for the shares should be fairly determined by the valuer appointed by it or Rs 28.80, whichever was higher.

Interestingly, it was the state government which had earlier quoted the price of 28.80 per share for selling its stake in HPL in its settlement proposal with the TCG.

The CLB also upheld allotment of 150 million shares by West Bengal government to public sector petro major, Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), which had prompted TCG to move CLB.

TCG, owned by NRI businessman Prunendu Chatterjee, and West Bengal government had floated the Rs 5,170 crore HPL project with Tatas being a minor stakeholder in the company.

Subsequently, major differences cropped up between the two main joint venture partners with the TCG strongly opposing the state government's proposal to bring in IOC to help HPL turnaround.