Pandey replaces Anil Kumar Khachi who goes back on repatriation to his parent cadre of Himachal Pradesh on personal grounds with immediate effect, a statement on Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) said.
The ACC last week had assigned Department of Economic Affairs Secretary Atanu Chakraborty additional responsibility as the Dipam Secretary after Khachi went on leave from October 19, 2019 to November 6, 2019.
For the current fiscal, the government has an ambitious target of Rs 1.05 lakh crore.
The Union Cabinet has recently approved the new policy under which the Dipam has been made the nodal department for the government’s stake sale programme. This was done with a view to streamlining and speeding up the process, reducing the role of administrative ministries which often used to place hurdles in the path of major stake sales.
This year, the big ticket sales could include Air India and Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) privatisations, among a number of initial public offers (IPOs) and strategic sales whereby the government would surrender its majority ownership of the concerned companies.
As part of an economic stimulus package, the government has recently doled out Rs 1.45 lakh crore by way of a cut in the corporate tax rate.
Disinvestment proceeds will be critical for the government to stick to its current year fiscal deficit target of 3.3 per cent of the GDP.
The Dipam and the Niti Aayog will now jointly identify state-run companies for strategic disinvestment. The Dipam Secretary will co-chair the inter-ministerial group on disinvestment, along with the Secretaries of the concerned administrative ministries, according to an official source.
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The change at the helm of Dipam comes within a week of a group of Secretaries agreeing to the sale of the government’s entire stake of 53.29 per cent in BPCL, its 63.75 per cent stake in the Shipping Corporation of India (SCI), 30 per cent in Concor, 100 per cent in NEEPCO, and 75 per cent in THDC.
(IANS)
Prasanta Patnaik