RGPPL might turn defaulter on Thursday

Against total debt of Rs 9,000 cr, the company has so far repaid Rs 4,000 cr

Ratnagiri Gas & Power Pvt Ltd (RGPPL), which operates the 1,967-Mw Dabhol project, has said it won’t be able to service debt from August 1 due to paucity of funds.

An RGPPL official, who did not want to be identified, told Business Standard: “The company does not have enough funds to service its debt. If it fails to pay the monthly instalment of Rs 100.8 crore due on August 1, there is every possibility that RGPPL will turn defaulter. The project has been closed since July 15 due to the non-availability of gas. Besides, MahaVitaran (Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company) owes Rs 118 crore for the months of April, May and June. RGPPL has a total debt of Rs 9,000 crore from ICICI Bank, IDBI Bank, SBI and Canara Bank and it has so far repaid Rs 4,000 crore. The company’s annual outgo towards debt servicing is Rs 1,300 crore.” The official informed that managing director R K Srivastava would meet MahaVitaran MD Ajoy Mehta in a day or two to request an early payment.

A MahaVitaran official said RGPPL should resume power generation on a priority basis. The official added that MahaVitaran would pay towards its power purchase bills to RGPPL.

Business Standard in February had reported that the lenders were perturbed over the sorry state of affairs and were keen to recover their dues. An RGPPL official conceded that lenders wanted the company to fulfil its debt servicing commitment. ICICI Bank, IDBI Bank, SBI and Canara Bank collectively hold 18.12 equity in RGPPL, while the rest is held by 32.64 per cent each by NTPC and GAIL India and 16.94 per cent by MSEB Holding Company.

The official said the company has been repeatedly pursuing the restoration of gas with the Centre. RGPPL needs a total of 8.5 million standard cubic metre per day (mscmd) of gas to achieve 1,967 MW of generation. Of this, nearly 7.6 mscmd is linked to KG D6 gas, while 0.9 mscmd is from Oil & Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) through GAIL India. The project was closed down since June 6 till June 24 and later it was restarted from June 25 and was operating 250 MW up to July 15. Ever since, the project has been completely shut down..

The company has incurred a loss of Rs 1,156 crore towards fixed cost alone during 2012-13 as there was a total generation loss of 9,053 million units. The company has incurred a loss of Rs 156 crore towards fixed cost, following the generation loss of 298 million units during April and May 2013. RGPPL's generation loss was 3,095 million units in 2011-12.