The bidding for the Uttar Pradesh government sugar mills has again been put off until November.
The Allahabad High Court is hearing petitions challenging the proposed transfer of ownerships of these mills spread across the state.
The government had put a total of 35 sugar mills, including 11 UP Sugar Corporation mills and 24 cooperative units on block for privatisation.
The date of filing financial bids for 11 corporation and 15 federation units have been extended to November 6 and 4 respectively. The last date for filing technical bids for the remaining 7 federation mills remains October 21.
The state government had given an undertaking in the HC, that the financial bids would not be processed until the cases were settled.
“Since, the cases are listed for hearing in the months of November, we have extended the financial bid dates accordingly,” a senior official told Business Standard.
Meanwhile, there are reports of Bajaj Hindusthan holding talks with a major sugar producer of the state with mills in eastern and central UP for buying all its units.
Bajaj is the largest sugar producer in the country with about 16 units in UP.
When contacted, however, an official of the group – purportedly planning to exit the sugar sector – denied such development.
The crushing is likely to start in the first week of November and the State Advised Price (SAP) of cane for the 2009-10 crushing season is likely to be declared in the last week of October. There is utter shortage of cane this season like last year.
The cane area declined from 2.8 million hectares in 2007-08 to 1.79 million hectares in the current crushing season. The cane availability also came down from 160 million tonnes in 2007-08 to 98 million tonnes this year.
There are about 157 sugar mills in the state, of which 93 belong to the private sector. However, only about 132 are in working condition and had participated in the 2008-09 crushing season.
