Mumbai, Sept. 8: The Anil Ambani group has ratcheted up its stake in flagship Reliance Communications Ltd (R-Com) to 66.62 per cent at the end of an elaborate corporate reorganisation that has taken all of six months to complete.

Barring Reliance Petroleum Ltd (RPL), the recently listed refining company from the Mukesh D. Ambani stable where promoters hold 80 per cent, no other Reliance group company has such a high promoter shareholding.

This raises a key question: are the brothers turning their back on the philosophy of patriarch Dhirubhai and taking their cues from industrialists like Azim Premji who holds almost 80 per cent in his flagship Wipro?

The question is important since it marks a break with a hoary tradition within the Reliance group where Dhirubhai was comfortable holding a reasonable stake in his companies and had no worries about handing out large chunks of his shareholding to the public at large, thereby spawning an equity culture in the country.

It’s not only in R-Com that Anil Ambani has a more than comfortable stake. The promoter holding in Reliance Capital is put at 62.55 per cent and that in Reliance Energy at 53.38 per cent.

On the other hand, the promoter holding in Reliance Industries, which is controlled by Mukesh Ambani, is placed at 49.83 per cent.

The high promoter holding in R-Com is a consequence of the amalgamation of eight entities with the company. But Anil Ambani has also been mopping up shares from the market to raise his stake in the telecom giant. Over the past five months, Anil Ambani and persons acting in concert have raised over 5.09 crore shares from the market amounting to about 4.16 per cent of the overall equity.

Besides Anil Ambani, the persons and entities buying these shares from the market include wife Tina, sons Jai Anmol and Jai Anshul, mother Kokilaben Ambani, Anadha Enterprise, Bhavan Mercantile, Reliance Innoventures, AAA Communications, Hansdhawni Trading Company, Sonata Investments, Reliance Capital and Reliance General Insurance Company.

Stocking up

In late August, R-Com told the stock exchanges that these entities bought over 2.50 crore shares that comprised 2.05 per cent of the company’s equity from the open market. This resulted in holding of the acquirers and the persons acting in concert rising to 44.34 per cent. Earlier in July, the company announced that over 2.58 crore shares or 2.11 per cent of the company was acquired between April 1 and June 23.

During the first quarter of this fiscal ended June 30, total promoter holding in R-Com stood at 42.23 per cent. The 66.62 per cent holding is a result of the merger of eight entities with the company. As the amalgamation was done through a share-swap deal, it led to a rise in promoters’ holding.

Sources, however, rule out the possibility of Anil Ambani raising the stake in Reliance Communications up to 75 per cent.