Indore Municipal Corporation's green bonds generate over Rs 720 crore

The green bonds floated by the Indore Municipal Corporation (IMC) as a public issue for setting up solar power plants has received a overwhelming response from investors and attracted a subscription of around Rs 721 crore.

This amount is almost six times more than the base price of the issue of Rs 122 crore, IMC officials said on Tuesday.

According to officials, IMC had floated green bonds to raise a total of Rs 244 crore for setting up a 60 MW solar power plant, the first of its kind offering by any civic body in the country in the capital market.

They said that on February 10, the first day of opening of the bond, it received a subscription of Rs 661.52 crore, while at the time of its closure on Tuesday, the amount reached Rs 720.75 crore.

Officials said that this public issue raised the maximum amount of Rs 229.35 crore from institutional investors, while it received subscription of Rs 204.57 crore from corporate investors.

They informed that the issue received subscriptions of Rs 176.33 crore and Rs 110.50 crore from retail investors and high net-worth individuals (HNIs), respectively.

Officials said the money raised from the green bond would be used to set up a solar power plant that would generate electricity to bring water from Narmada River in Jalud village in neighbouring Khargone district, some 80 kilometres from Indore.

IMC has to spend about Rs 300 crore every year to bring Narmada water from Jalud to Indore on electricity to pump water to every household and this solar power plant will bring down this amount significantly.