The government will soon come out with a policy on strategic sale of state-owned companies and the disinvestment will not be confined to loss making enterprises.
"May be later in the year, the government will come out with a policy prescription for strategic sale. We will be doing strategic sale," Disinvestment Secretary Neeraj Kumar Gupta told reporters here today.
"Broadly, the strategic sale is that government is selling the equity of the company along with the controlling management. How much stake will be sold, it will vary from place to place and company to company," he added.
The previous NDA government led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee had from 1999 to 2004 privatised about a dozen state-owned firms and hotels including Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd (VSNL), Bharat Aluminium Company Ltd (BALCO), CMC Ltd and Hindustan Zinc (HZL). But the policy was buried after the UPA came to power and only minority stake sales was pursued since then.
"I will go by what the Finance Minister and PM have said on where government should be in the business, that is one issue.
"And the second issue is, in the last Budget speech it was very clear that we do strategic sale but we will not confine to loss making CPSEs. Whatever is the policy statement we will go by that. So that will unfold, I am sure, very soon and we will wait for that," Gupta said.
As a policy, he said, the government should continue to do minority as well as strategic sale.
"So we, without sticking to any time line, as per the commitment of the government, are divesting in the CPSEs," he added.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in 2015-16 Budget had said that the government will raise Rs 28,500 crore by way of strategic stake sale.
But with no specific policy detailing how to select a PSU for strategic stake sale, methodology for valuation and the process to be followed, the disinvestment department could not go ahead with selling any PSU so far this fiscal.
The vacuum is being sought to be filled with a comprehensive policy.
