Visakha Steel Plant- The management has extended the deadline for Expression of Interest (EOI) bids for raising capital by another five days. As the pre-fixed deadline was completed on Saturday afternoon, the decision was taken to extend it for another five days. However, the steel plant management said that 21 companies have submitted bids so far. With the extension of five days, there is a chance to bid till 3 pm on 20th of this month. Former CBI JD Lakshminarayana also participated in steel plant bidding. He rallied with the steel industry workers for twenty kilometers and filed the bid documents in two sealed covers.
There is a campaign going on for a few days that Telangana government will buy it. But the orders issued by the Center on the acquisition of public sector companies say that it is not possible. The Center has made a provision that no state government or any other government organization can buy central government sector organizations. The order states that even if any state government comes forward to buy the steel plant, the permission of the central government is mandatory. With this, there is a campaign that the Center has once again blocked the efforts of Telangana.
The central government has issued guidelines in 2022 on disinvestment and privatization of public sector enterprises. Although the Center has not issued any notification on the disinvestment of Vizag Steel Plant, it has made it clear that it will go ahead with the privatization. The officials of Singareni met with the officials of Visakha Steel Plant and collected the bidding details.