One year of IL&FS scam: Kotak says to repay half debt by Mar;

The bankrupt IL&FS Group is aiming to address repayment of half of its debt pile of over Rs 94,000 crore through resolution, recovery and restructuring by the end of March. The group has also identified resolution plan for all its 302 entities--169 domestic and 133 international ones.

"Our good faith view at this point in time is that we should be able to recover, restructure and/or resolve above 50 percent of the debt," board chairman Uday Kotak, who was given a one-year extension by the government on the first anniversary of the group going bust Tuesday told reporters. As of October 8, 2018, the group had an external fund-based debt of Rs 94,216 crore and an additional non- fund-based debt of Rs 5,139 crore.

Over the past one year since it went bust exactly a year ago this day, the group has been able to address Rs 36,400 crore of debt, and an additional debt of around Rs 17,000 crore is likely to be addressed by March 2020, he said. Kotak said the group is also looking at InvITs as a possible mechanism monetization of completed road projects.

"For the roads where we would have felt that the bids are lower than what we would like and the roads for which we have not received any bids, we are considering InvITs," he added. Kotak said the group is looking to monetize businesses that are going concern, sell investments where it has minority stakes and real estates. "All these processes are going parallel and we are working aggressively on asset monetisation".

The diversified group is expecting Rs 3,000-3,500 crore from sale of real estate assets, including its headquarters at the tony BKC business district in the city. The group has launched public processes for 65 entities, including 54 domestic and 11 international ones. It will also launch the similar process for 11 other entities.

The group is also expecting to complete sale of its seven wind power units to Orix of Japan in the next few weeks. The deal was inked in August, which involves the Japanese partner buying out the remaining 49 percent equity in all the seven SPVs for. Rs 4,800 crore.

Chief operating officer N Sivaraman said the group recovered over Rs 1,200 crore from loans made to non-IL&FS group entities and it was also able to reduce its wage bill by 45 percent since the new board took over last October. For its education business, which includes four assets, it has received binding bids worth Rs 630 crore. These bids would be submitted to relevant committee of creditors for approval..

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