Govt may miss FY23 revised divestment target, says Bank of Baroda

The Union government has garnered divestment proceeds of roughly Rs 31,107 crore so far this fiscal year (FY23) and is likely to miss the revised target of Rs 50,000 crore, Bank of Baroda said in an analyst note on Thursday.

The note, authored by Bank of Baroda economist Sonal Badhan, said if the Centre decided to reduce the stake of all state-owned companies to 51 per cent, the potential kitty for divestment would be around Rs 3.5 trillion.

“Of this, Rs 1.7 trillion can come from public sector enterprises and Rs 1.8 trillion from public sector financial institutions,” the report stated.

“The government has managed only around Rs 31,000 crore as disinvestment proceeds so far. But there have been compensations in the form of high dividends of around Rs 50,000 crore. As the government disinvests, there will also be a tendency for dividends to come down,” said Madan Sabnavis, chief economist at Bank of Baroda.