Owing to legal hurdles, the proposed sale of government sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh continues to hang fire even as the process has been yet again deferred to April.
The government had put a total of 35 sugar mills, including 11 Sugar Corporation mills and 24 federation units, on block for privatisation.
Cases pertaining to the proposed sale are pending both in the Supreme Court and Allahabad High Court. While the Lucknow Bench of Allahabad HC has stayed the sale process of federation mills over the petition filed by district cane societies, Allahabad HC has stayed the sale of corporation units.
“We have fixed April 9 for the private parties to file Request for Proposal (RfP) for the Corporation units,” UP Sugar Corporation managing director Vinay Priya Dubey told Business Standard.
Meanwhile, the date for filing financial bids for 7 federation units has been fixed as April 19, official sources said.
The financial bids for 15 federation mills are yet to be opened, while Allahabad HC has stayed the sale of two federation units for being subject to multi-state ownership issue with Uttarakhand.
Short-listed private parties vying for these mills had already been apprised of their reserved price. Top companies in fray, include Bajaj Hindusthan, Indian Potash, Wave Industries, Lakshmi Sugar, Dalmia Sugar, Patel Engineering, SBEC Bioenergy, Tikaula Sugar Mills, Dwarkesh Sugar Industries, Balrampur Sugar, Triveni Engineering, Rama and Oswal Groups. The state government had aimed to close the sale process last year itself, however, the legal issues did not allow it to materialise.
As sweetener, UP i s offering industrial alcohol license and assurance of existing cane area to individual units even after the sale.
