The Board of Directors of Coal India Ltd (CIL) has approved the payment of Interim dividend for the financial year 2015-16 @ Rs. 27.40 a share on the face value of Rs. 10. The payment of interim dividend would start from March 21, CIL informed stock exchanges. Earlier, CIL had fixed March 15 as the ‘record date’ for the purpose of payment of interim dividend. The total outgo for the CIL’s interim dividend would be around Rs. 20, 830 crore including the dividend distribution tax. The Government of India, which holds 79.65 per cent stake in CIL, will get Rs. 17,308 crore.

The government has been able to mobilise a little over Rs 18,300 crore from divestment this fiscal year till February against the target of Rs 69,500 crore due to volatility in stock markets. As an alternative to selling stake through public offers, the government had asked cash-rich Coal India Ltd, National Aluminium Co Ltd (NALCO), NMDC Ltd and MOIL Ltd, among half a dozen PSUs, to buy back shares or announce additional dividend on the top of mandated 30 per cent.

The government has raised over Rs 18,330 crore this fiscal year so far through disinvestment in six PSUs – NTPC (Rs 5,030 crore), Rural Electrification Corp (Rs 1,608 crore), Power Finance Corp (Rs 1,671 crore), Dredging Corp of India Ltd (Rs 53.33 crore), Indian Oil Corp (Rs 9,369 crore) and Engineers India Ltd (Rs 640 crore).

What is Disinvestment?

Disinvestment can be defined as the action of an organisation (or government) selling or liquidating an asset or subsidiary. It is also referred to as ‘divestment’ or ‘divestiture.’ In simple words, when Government sells its shares of a PSU, to private sector company/individual, it is called Disinvestment.