Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta Group expresses interest in buying government’s stake in BPCL

Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta Group on Wednesday confirmed that it is among those who expressed their interest in acquiring Government of India’s stake in the state-run refinery Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL). “Vedanta’s EoI for BPCL is to evaluate potential synergies with our existing oil and gas business,” news agency PTI quoted a Vedanta spokesperson as saying. BPCL received multiple bids by the end of the deadline on Monday, however, reports suggest that big wigs like Reliance Industries, Aramco, Total, and BP gave the divestment offer a miss.

The government plans to sell its entire 52.98 per cent stake in BPCL. On Monday the Secretary, Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) tweeted, “For strategic disinvestment of BPCL, multiple expressions of interest have been received by the Transaction Advisor. The Transaction will  move to the second stage after scrutiny by TA.” The government has not delved into the details and has not made any names public.

Stake sale in BPCL is a part of the government divestment plans for the current fiscal year. The government is working on completing the stake sale process of about 23 public sector companies whose divestment has already been cleared by the Cabinet. For the 2020-21 fiscal, the government has set a disinvestment target of Rs 2.10 lakh crore. Of this, Rs 1.20 lakh crore will come from disinvestment of public sector undertakings and another Rs 90,000 crore from stake sale in financial institutions.

Vedanta’s spokesperson have said that their expression of interest is at a preliminary stage and exploratory in nature. Shares of Vedanta Limited closed 1.35% higher on Wednesday at Rs 108.80 per share. Vedanta’s share price has fallen after the recent delisting attempts by the promoter group did not succeed.