New Delhi, Aug. 2: The government has taken a special aprroach to facilitate selloffs in six sick PSUs to make them meet the minimum 10 per cent public shareholding norm stipulated by Sebi.

It will set up a corpus, called Special National Investment Fund (SNIF), for the six sick PSUs — Calcutta-based Andrew Yule, HMT, ITI, Scooters India, Fertilizer and Chemcial (Travancore) Ltd and Hindustan Photofilms Manufacturing Company.

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs yesterday approved this special fund, information and broadcasting minister Manish Tewari told reporters here.

Special National Investment Fund will be maintained outside the Consolidated Fund of India and will be managed by independent professional fund managers.

Shares of the companies transferred to the fund will be sold in the capital market gradually over a period of five years by the fund managers. The modalities of the sale and the price will be decided by the existing empowered group of ministers. The proceeds received by SNIF from the sale of these shares will be used for social sector schemes of the government.

Farm interest

The government has also approved plans for interest subsidy on short-term farm loans, Tewari said. The subsidy proposal was announced earlier in the Union budget this year.

The scheme provides for short-term crop loans at concessional rates of 7 per cent. An additional subvention of 3 per cent are being provided to those farmers who repay their loans on time, he said, adding, the effective rate of interest for such farmers will be 4 per cent per annum.

“This scheme has already been extended to crop loans borrowed from private sector scheduled commercial banks for loans given within the service area of the branch concerned,” Tewari said.