NTPC, the country’s largest power utility, plans to acquire only those stressed power projects undergoing insolvency proceedings in the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) to grab better deals.“NTPC has decided to go slow on expansion of its capacity addition through acquisition of stressed power assets. The company is now looking at only those projects which would go under hammer as part of the insolvency process,” a source told PTI.
Earlier the company was also interested in acquiring the projects through negotiations with project developers because the government wanted to resolve the issues of beleaguered assets. “Now, the company is looking at NCLT route as it would help the NTPC to acquire these projects at higher discounts,” he added. All insolvency deals so far in the NCLT have got discounts of up to 70 per cent or even more from secured creditors.
NTPC had planned to expand its power generation capacity by around 6 GW through acquiring brown-field projects because setting up a green-field power plant requires a lot of time and resources. But nothing much has been done so far to achieve the objective.
In September 2018, the apex court had ruled that status quo would be maintained in case of stressed assets going through insolvency proceedings. That means all projects which were outside the NCLT would not be subject to insolvency proceedings till the matter is subjudice. The case is still pending. (With agency inputs)