As President Pratibha Patil talked of disinvestment in unlisted public sector units through public offers, the Finance Ministry told that it is assessing market conditions for IPOs by NHPC, Oil India and these issues are not expected before the month of August this year.

A senior Finance Ministry source told a news agency that “Market conditions are not ripe at this time. The right time will be awaited. It will not be done before August,”

NHPC, India’s largest hydro-electric company now wholly- owned by the government, plans to issue 167 crore fresh equity shares and dilution of 5 per cent government’s holdings.

OIL, an explorer and producer headquartered in Assam, plans to issue 2.6 crore million shares, resulting in dilution of government equity by 10 per cent. Both the companies had received all necessary regulatory approvals in the month of September in 2008.

The target has not been fixed yet, the market conditions will be observed regularly.

The Government has a time to go for public offers of Oil India by 10th September and NHPC by September 17 this year. Otherwise, the two companies will have to again approach market regulator SEBI for seeking its nod.