NRL disinvestment complete as OIL, EIL, Assam govt acquire BPCL’s shares

• A Sale Purchase Agreement was signed on March 25 between BPCL and the consortium of Oil India Limited (OIL) and Engineers India Limited (EIL)

• After the completion of the acquisition of shares, OIL's stake in NRL has increased to 80.16 percent, EIL's stands at 4.37 percent

New Delhi: A consortium of state-run Oil India Ltd (OIL), Engineers India Ltd (EIL) and the Assam government have completed the acquisition of Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd's (BPCL) shares in Numaligarh Refinery Ltd (NRL), thereby completing the disinvestment process, the companies have informed the bourses in separate regulatory filings. "… a Sale Purchase Agreement has been signed on 25th March 2021 between BPCL and the consortium of Oil India Limited (OIL) and Engineers India Limited (EIL) ("Consortium") for sale of 43,05,83,886 equity shares of Rs 10/- each held by BPCL in Numaligarh Refinery Ltd to the consortium at a consideration of Rs 9375,96,41, 177. Upon receipt of consideration, shares have been transferred to OIL and EIL today," said BPCL in a regulatory filing on Friday.

"Remaining 2,29,62, 11 2 equity shares have been transferred to Govt. of Assam on receipt of consideration of Rs. 499,99,99,888," said BPCL.

NRL Disinvestment: New Shareholding pattern

After the completion of the acquisition of shares, OIL's stake in NRL has increased to 80.16 percent, EIL's stands at 4.37 percent and that of the Assam government stands at 26 percent. The disinvestment of NRL was a key step towards the privatisation of BPCL. Even as the government had decided to privatise BPCL in November 2019, it had said that NRL will continue to be a public sector company and will be carved out of BPCL before disinvestment.

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In the Budget presented on March 6, Assam state Finance Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had said that the state government has allocated a sum of Rs 1,500 crore for the acquisition of additional stake in NRL. "We have decided to acquire 13.65% additional stake. Accordingly, a sum of Rs.1500 Crore in this Budget 2020-21 has been allocated for the extra stake in Numaligarh Refinery Ltd (NRL)," the minister had said.

NRL is now an OIL subsidiary

Post the signing of the share purchase agreement, NRL has now become a subsidiary of OIL. NRL is currently implementing a refinery expansion project under which it is expanding its refining capacity from 3 MTPA to 9 MTPA at an investment of Rs 22,594 crore. The expansion is expected to be completed by 2024. The state-run company is also setting up crude oil pipeline from Paradip in Odisha to Numaligarh and a product pipeline from Numaligarh to Siliguri in West Bengal under the same project. The consolidated total income of NRL for the financial year ended March 31, 2020 was Rs 14,244.29 crore, ie 4.29 percent of the consolidated total income of BPCL for the financial year March 31, 2020.

The consolidated net worth of Numaligarh Refinery Limited as of March 31, 2020 was Rs 5,292.00 crore, ie 14.18 percent of the consolidated net worth of BPCL, as on March 31, 2020.

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