'Centre May Review LIC IPO Timing': FM Sitharaman as Tensions Rise in Ukraine

"Ideally, I'd like to go ahead with it because we'd planned it for some time," she said.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the government might review the timing of the much-anticipated public listing of the LIC, amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.

(Photo: Qamar Sibtain/IANS)

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in an interview given to the Business Line on Tuesday, 1 March, said that the government might review the timing of the much-anticipated public listing of the LIC, considering the ongoing war in Ukraine.

"Ideally, I'd like to go ahead with it because we'd planned it for some time based purely on Indian considerations," Sitharaman said.

"But if global considerations warrant that I need to look at it, I wouldn't mind looking at it again," she added, hinting at a possible change of the timeline.

The review could potentially affect the government's target of the $10.4 billion asset-sale programme.

The IPO for LIC was expected to go on floors by March after being pegged at a valuation of 5.4 trillion rupees earlier in February.

"When a private sector promoter takes this call, he only has to explain this to the company's board. But I would have to explain it to the whole world," Sitharaman said while outlining the complicacies of the decision.

(With inputs from Business Line.)