Poor to get loans to buy Upper Tamakoshi shares

DOLKHA, FEB 19 -

The Tamakoshi Stakeholder Committee will help indigent people get loans from banks and financial institutions (BFIs) so that they can buy the shares that have been allocated for them by the Upper Tamakoshi Hydropower Project.

The project has offered a maximum of 70 shares worth Rs 100 apiece to each person which means they will have to make an initial investment of Rs 7,000.

Since all the people in the district entitled to buy shares in the project may lack the cash to do so, the Stakeholder Committee has urged BFIs to lend them money against its guarantee and keep the stock certificates as collateral.

A number of cooperatives in the district have already announced that they will issue loans to the needy to enable them to participate in the share issuance of the national pride project. However, the BFIs here have been a little reluctant to provide credit as the project’s shares have not yet been floated. As per the latest census, there are 280,848 people in the district qualified to buy shares in the Upper Tamakoshi project. Last Thursday, it floated 36,006,000 shares worth Rs 3.6 billion in what is the largest share offering in the country’s history.

The shares have been allocated to locals of Dolkha district, depositors at the Employees Provident Fund and employees of the organizations that are developing and financing the project. The local people will get 10 percent of the shares worth Rs 1.05 billion.

In order to enable all the eligible people to get shares in the project, there has been a consensus in the Stakeholder Committee that the deadline to deposit the application money will be extended for poor people.

“It has been decided to extend the deadline for them to arrange the money to purchase shares,” said Parbat Gurung, lawmaker from Dolkha Constituency 1. There are around 150,000 people associated with cooperatives in Dolkha. The cooperatives will arrange loans for the needy among them.

However, banks have said that they cannot extend loans to buy shares. Pralhad KC, manager of Rastriya Banijya Bank, Charikot, said that the bank could lend money to the people for other income generating activities.  

The Stakeholder Committee has also made arrangements to make it convenient for migrant workers to buy shares in the project. “They can download the form and send a scanned copy after filling it,” said Ganesh Neupane, spokesperson of the project.

Meanwhile, the possibility of allowing local people from Dolkha to invest more in the project if its cost goes up from the estimated Rs 25.29 billion is being discussed. The Stakeholder Committee has decided that the share for local people will be increased in proportion to the rise in the project cost.

Source: The Kathmandu Post