Crony Capitalism and Baba Ramdev:

Crony Capitalism and Baba Ramdev:

Ruchi Soya, a listed company goes into insolvency. They owed Rs. 12146 crores to PSU banks. SBI writes off 933 crores and settles its dues of Rs. 1,816 crore to 883 crores. Other banks - PNB, CBI etc write off more than half their loans

2. Having reduced the liabilities to less than half, NCLT puts it up for sale. Only two bidders remained - Patanjali and Adani Wilmar. Adanis having bid initially, withdraw, leaving only Patanjali in the race.

3. The bid of Patanjali was Rs. 4350 crores of which 3250 crores would be funded by banks led by SBI a bank that wrote off 933 crores. The security for the loans were th ioe same Ruchi Soya stock which was written down to Zero in the Debt restructuring plan agreed by the banks.

4. Now we have a situation where the banks that wrote off massive amounts are now funding another loan to Patanjali to acquire the same company where they wrote off debts .

5. It doesn't stop here. SEBI mandates a 25% public shareholding to be listed on the stock exchanges to ensure liquidity and avoid price manipulation. NCLT played along and ordered listing even though public shareholding was just 1%. SEBI played dead and did not challenge order

6. Price manipulation begins. There were no sellers in the market. Even the 1% was closely held. The stock zoomed from Rs.3.50 to Rs. 1053 in two years. Now, Ruchi Soya, a company that Patanjali acquired in Dec 2019 with just 1000 crore of own money is valued at Rs.31,190 Crores

7. Ruchi Soya, now owned 99.5% by Patanjali, is now coming with a public issue diluting just 20% and raising 4300 crores. Remember, they bought 100% of the company at 4350 crores. They will also repay all the debt with investor money.

8. The bankers wrote off a few thousand crores. The initial shareholders were written off to zero. The bankers again funded the acquisition of the same company with securities of the same shares by Baba Ramdev. The small investors will again buy equity worth 4300 crores.

9. The same banks may subscribe to the shares in the QIP portion. Someday, these bankers may be investigated for using our money to enrich an individual. The depositors lost. The shareholders lost. And Baba Ramdev will own 80% of a 31000-crore company with no investment