NEW DELHI: National Investment and Infrastructure Fund (NIIF), India’s first sovereign fund to promote infra development, on Friday assured Finance Minister Arun Jaitley of strong investment pipeline for the roads, ports, aviation and power sectors.
The governing council expressed its desire for NIIF to function as a major platform in India to leverage and attract overseas long-term investments in various infrastructure sectors in the country, it said, adding that it is considering investments in third party managed funds focused on clean energy, affordable housing and medium sized infrastructure firms.
Reviewing the performance of the NIIF on Friday, Jaitley said there is a steady progress on fund-raising efforts with several international institutional investors. It also informed that the council was following-up on MoUs signed by the government. The first fund-raising by NIIF is expected to close soon, the finance ministry said in a statement.
The Council wants NIIF to function as a major platform in India to leverage and attract overseas long-term investments in various infrastructure sectors in the country.
NIIF was set up as the investment vehicle in 2015 and has a mandate to fund commercially viable projects – new projects, expansion and stalled projects. With 49 per cent equity participation from the government, the remaining comes from the private sector.
The Department of Economic Affairs had signed an agreement with the NIIF for a Rs 20,000-crore contribution to the Fund.
As far as the operational status of NIIF is concerned, it was informed that a team of twelve staff, including the CEO, National Investment and Infrastructure Fund Ltd is now in place.
“Further recruitments of high quality staff through a global search process is underway. Strong international response to hiring and advertisements for recruitment of expert staff has been received,” it said.