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FIs ready to takeover DPC: IDBI chief

Industrial Development Bank of India on Friday said financial institutions were 'ready to take over the troubled $3 billion power project of Enron promoted Dabhol Power Company if the energy major wished to quit.'

"We have a tremendous amount of exposure in the project. The FIs can run the plant if Enron wants to move out. We shall appoint an operations and maintenance contractor," IDBI acting chairman and managing director S K Chakrabarti told reporters after the FI's annual general meeting in Bombay.

He said the institution has also received communications and informal feelers from US-based energy companies willing to take over the controversial 2,184-mw project in Dabhol.

When enquired whether the other US energy major AES was one of them, Chakrabarti declined to give details. He, however, added that no Indian company has evinced any interest.

Referring to the late submission of DPC's valuation report by global energy consultants Stone & Websters, the IDBI chief said the FIs had come down heavily on them demanding an explanation for the same.

"We have pulled them up for such an act and are in direct dialogue with DPC over the issue," he added.

Chakrabarti said IDBI was in talks with Bechtel, GE and Enron Engineering and Construction, construction contractors for the project, to resume work on Phase II, which is 92 per cent complete.

"We told the Enron management that the FIs should have been taken into confidence before taking such a step," he said.

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