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National Monetisation Pipeline – Fueling Economic Growth

INTRODUCTION

Monetisation of assets has  been  identified as one of the pillars for enhanced and sustainable infrastructure financing. The Finance Minister of India (“FM”) had, in December 2019, announced a National Infrastructure Pipeline (“NIP”) that envisages an investment of INR 111 lakh crore in the infrastructure sector in the period between 2019 and 2025 and brings in various opportunities for private sector to invest in infrastructure projects including the development and operation of the same. The FM in the annual budget 2021-2022 announced the launch of a new national monetisation pipeline[1] to bridge the gaps in infrastructure funding projects under the NIP and to unlock value from the current public investment in infrastructure through private sector efficiencies in operations and management of infrastructure. The NITI Aayog has now created the National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP Volumes I & II) (“NMP”) in respect of the brownfield core infrastructure assets. The NMP is in furtherance of the Government of India’s (“Government”) strategic divestment policy, which aims to limit Government’s presence to only a select identified sectors with the rest to be handed to private players.

Continue Reading National Monetisation Pipeline – Fueling Economic Growth

The Covid-19 pandemic has affected the society in an unanticipated and unprecedented way. To contain its spread, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), Government of India vide its order dated March 24, 2020 directed closure of commercial and private establishments for a period of twenty one days. Immediately thereafter, the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways (MoRTH) issued an order dated March 25, 2020 directing the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to take action as per the said MHA order (including suspension of tolling operations on the toll plazas) and added that prevailing condition may be treated as ‘force majeure’ under the concession agreements executed by NHAI with the developers.

MoRTH thereafter directed NHAI to resume toll collections from April 20, 2020. However, the suspension of toll operations until April 20, 2020, the lockdown period thereafter and the steep fall of the traffic plying on the national highways, has significantly impacted the entire transportation industry, exposing developers to high risk and financial distress with no visibility of normalcy in the near future.

Continue Reading Covid-19: Bumpy roads ahead for Highway Sector

 

Change is inevitable. Growth is optional.

– John Maxwell

Covid-19 has seen the legal landscape leapfrog into digital courts, electronic filings and asynchronous video hearings. The change has been fundamental and deep deliberations are currently underway for the systemic adoption of a new normal. Such a material shift often facilitates rapid adoption of other innovations that were hitherto stuck at the threshold of a conservative mindset. We believe that Third Party Funding of litigation is one such legal innovation that will now come of age in India.

Continue Reading Cash constrained and need to litigate? Third Party Funding may be the solution

How special are “special equities”- Analysis of invocation of bank guarantee during COVID-19

“A pandemic, of the nature which affects the world today, has not visited us during the lifetime of any of us and, hopefully, would not visit us hereinafter either. The devastation, human, economic, social and political, that has resulted as a consequence thereof, is unprecedented. The measures, to which the executive administration has had to resort, to somehow contain the fury of the pandemic, are equally unprecedented. The situation of nationwide lockdown, in which we find ourselves today, has never, earlier, been imposed on the country. The imposition of the lockdown was by way of a sudden and emergent measure, of which no advance knowledge could be credited to the petitioner – or, indeed, to anyone else.” – C. Hari Shankar, J., April 20, 2020.

The above quote aptly sums up the current situation globally and domestically. The COVID-19 outbreak has created a void in terms of performance of commercial contracts and has in many cases left the parties on edge. Through this article, we aim to provide an insight into the orders passed by the judiciary during COVID-19, dealing with an otherwise settled issue i.e. the invocation of bank guarantee. Continue Reading How special are “special equities”- Analysis of invocation of bank guarantee during COVID-19