The Reserve Bank of India, RBI has relaxed the External Commercial Borrowings, ECB norms to help infrastructure sector companies raise more funds from overseas markets. In a notification yesterday, the RBI allowed companies engaged in infrastructure sector to raise bridge finance from overseas market under the automatic route. Under the earlier provision, the companies were required to take permission of the RBI for raising bridge finance, which is a kind of interim arrangement for short-term credit.

The Reserve Bank, through a separate notification, has also allowed companies in infrastructure sector to raise ECB up to a maximum period of 5 years for importing capital goods. Under the new norms, the trade credit should not be for a period of less than 15 months and also not in the nature of short-term rollover finance. The RBI also relaxed the ECB norms for repayment of Rupee loans within the overall ceiling of 20 billion Dollars.