New Delhi : With the disinvestment target set to be missed for the 16th time in 25 years, government on Monday proposed to revive strategic sale of PSUs as well as monetise idle assets.
The Department of Disinvestment, which was carved out of the Finance Ministry in 1999, has been renamed the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) to give impetus to the programme.
Against a target of Rs 41,000 crore from sale of minority stakes in central public sector units, the proceeds will total only Rs 25,312.60 crore in the current fiscal. The target for Rs 28,500 crore from strategic sale will draw a blank, reports PTI.
For next fiscal, the minority stake sale target has been kept at Rs 36,000 crore while another Rs 20,500 crore is being targeted from strategic stake sale. The total target from disinvestment stands at Rs 56,500 crore.
With no strategic stake sale policy being in place, the government could not in the current fiscal privatise any PSU. But now a Core Group of Secretaries on Disinvestment or CGD on strategic sale has been set up.
In his Budget speech, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said: “We will encourage CPSEs to divest individual assets like land, manufacturing unit to release their asset value for making investments in new projects.
