Budget

Foreign Investment

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) continue to repose great confidence in India. Net Fll investment in India is now over US$ 7 billion. During the course of this year I have expanded the opportunities for such investments. I propose to take one more step at the instance of Indian companies. The limit of aggregate investment in a company by Flls, NRIs and NRI-OCBs is now 24%. I propose to allow companies to raise this limit to 30%, subject to the condition that the Board of Directors of the company approves the limit and the general body of the company passes a special resolution in this behalf. Venture capital funds are important vehicles for stimulating investments in new ventures. Under the present guidelines they can invest upto 5% of their corpus in the equity of any single company. This is unduly restrictive. The Iimit is being increased to 20%.