Norms Issued On Bidders & #8217; Qualification Criteria For Psu Sell-Off

The government today issued guidelines on the qualification criteria for bidders and advisors in the divestment process.

It will now be issuing showcause notices to the affected parties, namely the Hindujas, Videocon, Sterlite and Credit Suisse First Boston, fairly soon.

The disqualification criteria will come into effect immediately and will apply to all bidders for various disinvestment transactions which have not been completed as yet.

Henceforth, the criteria will be prescribed in the advertisements seeking expressions of interest (EoI) from the interested parties, said an official release. They will be required to provide information on the criteria along with their EoIs.

On non-security related offences, bidders are liable to be disqualified if any conviction or indictment by a regulatory authority, relates to a grave offence or casts a doubt on their ability to manage the public sector unit (PSU) after divestment.

This will mean that a company which has been barred from raising money from the domestic capital markets, can be allowed to bid for a PSU which does not require fund infusion or even if it can raise capital from foreign markets.

This will, however, be contingent on the government deciding that the nature of the offence is grave, that it