The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs gave an in principle approval for strategic disinvestment in Neelachal Ispat Nigam Limited (NINL).

NINL is a joint venture of the Centre and Odisha governments through their public sector enterprises. The company has an equity shareholding of Central public sector enterprises (CPSEs) Minerals & Metals Trading Corporation Limited (MMTC) (49.78 per cent), National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC) (10.10 per cent), MECON (0.68 per cent) and Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) (0.68 per cent) and Odisha government PSEs, Industrial Promotion and Investment Corporation of Odisha Limited (IPICOL) (12 per cent) and Odisha Mining Corporation (OMC) (20.47 per cent).

An official statement said that NINL will be divested to a strategic buyer, identified through a two-stage auction procedure. The proposed strategic disinvestment of NINL would unlock resources to be used to finance the social sector/developmental programmes of the Government benefiting the public.

Commenting on the decision, Union Minister Prakash Javadekar said that this will be a strategic disinvestment without transfer of management control.

NINL has set up an 1.1 million ton Integrated Iron and steel plant at Kalinganagar, Duburi, Dist-Jajpur, Orissa. Presently the main products are pig iron and LAM coke along with nut coke, coke breeze, crude tar, ammonium sulphate and granulated slag (phase – I).

It has become India’s largest exporter of saleable pig iron since 2004-2005. The company supplies LAM coke to almost all steel plants of Steel authority of India Limited and Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited Vishakhapatanam.

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