Stocks' rally makes government richer

With such a massive gain in the value of shares held by it in the listed companies, the government has cornered nearly one-third of the overall surge of about Rs 7,50,000 crore in the market since the general elections results were declared on May 16 which gave a clear mandate to Manmohan Singh and his team to form the government for second consecutive term.

As the markets were closed on May 16 and the next two days were weekend holidays, there have been only five trading sessions — from May 18 to May 22 — since the results were declared. This five-day gain of about Rs 2,50,000 crore in the government’s stock portfolio is equivalent to nearly half of the total gain witnessed during the five years of the first term of the UPA government, beginning in May 2004.

The government’s shareholding across all the listed companies is at present valued at about Rs 11,30,000 crore. This includes about Rs 11,15,000 crore from the public sector firms in which government holds promoter stake, while another Rs 15,000 crore comes from companies in which it has non-promoter holding, such as Hindustan Zinc and IDFC.
While the government owns equity as promoter in more than 80 companies, there are more than 100 other companies in which the government holds shares but as non-promoter shareholders.