The Central government has approved Tata Steel Long Products (TSLP) bid to acquire 93.71 percent stake in Neelachal Ispat Nigam (NINL) for a bid price of Rs 12,100 crore.

TSLPL has around one million tpa of steelmaking capacity, 2,500 acre of land for future growth and iron ore reserves of around 100 million tonne.

NINL will become the core of TSLPL’s growth aspirations, as it is intended to not only restart the one million tonne steel plant expeditiously but also begin work immediately to build a 4.5 million tpa state-of-the-art long products complex in the next few years, and further expand it to 10 million tpa by around 2030.

TSLP outbid a consortium of Jindal Steel & Power and Nalwa Steel and Power; and JSW Steel, in financial bid put for buying NINL, Odisha Mining Corporation (OMC) and Industrial Promotion & Investment Corporation of Odisha (IPICOL).

The bid by TSLP was double the reserve price of Rs 5,616.97 crore set by the government.

NINL, a joint venture of four CPSEs -- Metals and Minerals Trading Corporation (MMTC), NMDC, Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL), MECON and 2 Odisha government PSUs – has 1.1 million tpa capacity non-functioning steel plant at Kalinganagar in Odisha.