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Banking on Modi government's determination to go ahead with disinvestment drive, Vedanta Resources chief Anil Agarwal said the company expects to pick up residual stakes in Hindustan Zinc and BALCO at "market driven value" soon.
"This government is very determined to go ahead and sell the shares. They are working on it and this financial year they want to disinvest and get this money.
"We are here to pay the right price and it is a very transparent process. We all abide by that," Agarwal told PTI about Hindustan Zinc (HZL) and BALCO.
London Stock Exchange-listed metal and mining conglomerate Vedanta Resources holds 64.9% stake in HZL and 51% stake in Balco. It had offered over USD 2.57 billion and USD 296.5 million respectively to buy government's residual stakes in these two firms in January 2012.
In August 2012, Vedanta got shareholders' approval to raise the offer by around 25% but the one-year approval period has expired.
"It has to be at a market driven value and in a most transparent manner. It is already there in the share purchase agreement. Very clear cut formula. So, they have to take a view (on) what they want to do," he said.
The billionaire claimed the previous government was "indecisive" but after his recent meeting with Finance Minister Arun Jaitley he was hopeful that the deal would be done soon and in a transparent manner. Agarwal had met Jaitley on December 24 last year.
"For sometime the (previous) government was indecisive, which I am sure this government won't be. It creates a very wrong signal (if you are indecisive).
"The shares were meant to be given, the whole idea was to disinvest. They had given us a time of five years to build up...Now it is ten years. I am very confident after meeting the Finance Minister and he was very confident that he will do it within this financial year," he said.
Agarwal said the "what happened in India" had not sent a good message to foreign investors.
"The foreign investor is not getting confidence and the most important thing is to creating stock value," he said.
Post disinvestment, HZL has grown five-fold from 0.17 million tonnes (MT) of metal to one MT. Silver production has also grown to 400 tonnes, making HZL the largest silver producer in India. It also added a 474 MW thermal power plant.
HZL has infused Rs 12,000 crore investments in four expansions.
"The mine life which was about 5-7 years at the time of disinvestment is today of about 35 years," Agarwal said.
As per the company, it has paid royalty to the tune of over Rs 1,000 crore in 2013-14. Its turnover was Rs 1,470 crore in 2002 and rose to Rs 13,459 crore in 2013-14.
