Tata Steel acquires 4.6 crore equity shares of NINL at a premium of Rs. 54/share

Bhubaneswar: Tata Steel Limited has, on February 21, 2023, acquired 4,68,75,000 equity shares of ₹10/- each at a premium of ₹54/- per share, of Neelachal Ispat Nigam Limited (NINL), an unlisted indirect subsidiary of the Company, for Rs.300 crore, being Tranche 1 of the investment in the equity shares of NINL.

“The proposed funding will be utilized towards the working capital and capex requirement of NINL including start-up of iron and steel plant at Kalinganagar, repayment/prepayment of liabilities and for other general corporate purposes” Tata Steel said in a regulatory filing.

NINL, located at Kalinganagar in Jajpur district is a joint venture of 4 CPSEs, namely MMTC, NMDC, BHEL, MECON and 2 Odisha Govt. PSUs, namely OMC and IPICOL. NINL has an integrated steel plant with a capacity of 1.1 MT along with iron ore mines with a reserve of 90 MT.

NINL was incorporated on March 27, 1982, under the Companies Act, 1956, to set- up an integrated steel plant to undertake manufacturing and sale of steel products. NINL initially set up a 1.1 MTPA blast furnace in 2002 to produce pig iron. Subsequently, other supporting facilities like sinter plant, coke oven plant, power plant, etc. were commissioned.

In January 31 last year, the Government of India had approved the loss-making PSU to Tata Steel for Rs.12100 crore. Six months later i.e. in July last year, Tata Steel Long Products Limited completed acquisition of 93.71% shares in NINL.