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  Business   Union Budget 2016: Disinvestment department to be renamed

Union Budget 2016: Disinvestment department to be renamed

| PAWAN BALI
Published : Mar 1, 2016, 1:55 am IST
Updated : Mar 1, 2016, 1:55 am IST

Finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Monday that general insurance companies will be listed on the stock exchanges and government will revive strategic sale of PSUs as well as monetise idle assets.

Finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Monday that general insurance companies will be listed on the stock exchanges and government will revive strategic sale of PSUs as well as monetise idle assets.

The department of disinvestment will be renamed as the “Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM)”. “A new policy for management of government investment in Public Sector Enterprises, including disinvestment and strategic sale, has been approved. We have to leverage the assets of CPSEs for generation of resources for investment in new projects,” said Mr Jaitley. He said that Centre will encourage CPSEs to divest individual assets like land and manufacturing units among others to release their asset value for making investment in new projects.

“NITI Aayog will identify the CPSEs for strategic sale,” said the finance minister.

Now a Core Group of Secretaries on Disinvestment or CGD on strategic sale has been set up. 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. Disinvestment secretary Neeraj Gupta said the government will adopt a comprehensive investment management strategy, not limited merely to disinvestments in equity to augment resources.

“Change in the name of the department clearly underlines the new approach of the government,” Mr Neeraj Gupta said.

Location: India, Delhi, New Delhi