The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, CCEA, has approved sale of 100 lakh tonnes of wheat in the open market.

The decision was taken at the CCEA meeting chaired by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh today.

According to highly placed sources, out of the 100 lakh tonnes, 85 lakh tonnes will be for sale to bulk consumers and 15 lakh tonnes for small consumers.

Meanwhile, Food Minister Prof. K V Thomas told reporters that the sale price of wheat will be 1,500 rupees per quintal ex-godown from Punjab excluding freight charges. He said, five lakh tonnes rice has also been allocated to States.

Prof. Thomas said that the Food Ministry will send a separate note to the Cabinet for export of two million of wheat from government stocks next week.

The CCEA also approved 5 per cent disinvestment in the public sector company, Neyveli Lignite Corporation. The government currently holds 93.5 per cent stake in it.

This will
help to garner around 466 crore rupees to the public exchequer.

Our Correspondent reports that Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa had last month written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, opposing disinvestment in the company.

She had said, divestment in the company would lead to labour unrest and disruption of power supply from Neyveli.

However, the disinvestment department had communicated to the CCEA that there is no other option but to divest the stake in the company to make it compliant with the SEBI norm.

SEBI has set a deadline of August 2013 for all listed Central public sector units to have a minimum 10 per cent public shareholding.