Multiple bids received for BPCL, no supermajor in race

New Delhi, November 16

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The government on Monday received ‘multiple’ bids for buying out its stake in India’s second-biggest fuel retailer BPCL but billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries and supermajors Saudi Aramco, BP and Total did not make a bid.

Tuhin Kanta Pandey, Secretary, Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM), which is handling the strategic sale, tweeted that the transaction advisers for the sale of government’s 52.98% stake in Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) have reported receiving “multiple expressions of interest.” “The transaction will move to the second stage after scrutiny by TA,” he said. TA stands for transaction adviser.

“Strategic disinvestment of BPCL progresses: Now moves to the second stage after multiple expressions of interest have been received,” Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman also tweeted.

Neither of them, however, gave the number of bids received or the names of the bidders.

Reliance Industries Ltd., which was considered a potential bidder, did not put in an expression of interest (EoI) at the close of the deadline on Monday. — PTI