BPCL Says Privatisation May Be Pushed To Next Fiscal

New Delhi: Privatisation of the nation's second-largest oil refiner Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) might have been pushed again to the subsequent fiscal 12 months as no bidder visited the agency's premises within the final quarter, a senior firm official stated on Wednesday.The authorities is promoting its whole 52.98 per cent stake in BPCL for which three expressions of curiosity (EoIs), together with one from billionaire Anil Agarwal-led Vedanta Group, have been obtained.Financial bids are but to be referred to as.At a convention name with analysts, BPCL's director (finance) V R Okay Gupta stated the agency continues to replace information for bidders within the fray for the federal government stake and can also be replying to their queries.During the third quarter (October-December 2021) "no major events happened in terms of bidder visits to our company premises and the status quo is same", he stated."We don't have any significant role in the disinvestment process," he stated. "Whatever due diligence, data requirements are there, every quarter we update the data requirements in the portal, and bidders are continuously accessing the data." BPCL, Mr Gupta stated, is updating info on the information room and replying to queries raised by the bidders."We are continuously updating, and we are getting some queries and we are replying, that process is on," he added.His assertion on no bidder visiting the corporate premises implied that both the three bidders have accomplished the bodily due diligence or that they've taken a pause for now.BPCL had in April 2021 opened a digital information room, largely containing monetary info on the corporate, and certified bidders signing confidentiality enterprise (CU) had been given entry.Bidders, which in addition to Vedanta embrace personal fairness companies Apollo Global and I Squared Capital's arm Think Gas, have been thereafter allowed bodily inspection of belongings akin to refineries and depots as a part of the due diligence course of.The authorities was to hunt monetary bids as soon as bidders accomplished due diligence and the phrases and circumstances of the share buy settlement (SPA) have been negotiated.