![](\"https:\/\/im.rediff.com\/money\/2021\/apr\/04infrastructure.jpg?w=670&h=900\")
<\/p>\nDuring his first Union Budget in July 2014, former finance minister Arun Jaitley announced the setting up of an institution called 3P India, with an allocation of Rs 500 crore.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The intention was to mainstream public-private partnerships (PPPs) in India.<\/p>\n
The plan was to bring together the capacities of the government and private sector to push PPP projects.<\/p>\n
However, it never moved beyond the announcement stage. Now, that is — eight years later — something similar or, in fact, bigger has been set up.<\/p>\n
The two infrastructure divisions of the finance ministry’s department of economic affairs have been moved out of North Block.<\/p>\n
They have taken up bigger offices on Janpath Road, and got in people from multilateral institutions and the private sector.<\/p>\n
The new institution is now called the Infrastructure Finance Secretariat (IFS).<\/p>\n
One of the Secretariat’s most important tasks would be to rework the existing PPP policy and bring it in tune with the Modi government’s infrastructure push.<\/p>\n
The new framework is expected to be out by the end of this calendar year, sources told Business Standard<\/em>.<\/p>\n Apart from this, the new organisation will also work on various infra-financing issues like deepening municipal bond markets, real estate and infrastructure investment trusts (REITs and InvITs).<\/p>\n It would also deal with asset monetisation, dispute resolution and other myriad subjects.n official said the two divisions — Infrastructure Policy and Planning and Infrastructure Support and Development — have taken infrastructure consultants from Asian Development Bank, World Bank, and KMPG.<\/p>\n These experts will help enhance the capacity of IFS.<\/p>\n The IFS will continue to be a part of DEA with economic affairs secretary Ajay Seth as its head.<\/p>\n “You have the Centre’s capex push, the National Infrastructure Pipeline, the National Monetisation Pipeline, the GatiShakti portal and others.<\/p>\n “The idea behind this secretariat is to provide overall support in all these aspects.<\/p>\n “It would find ways to make infrastructure financing more effective,” said the official.<\/p>\n The IFS has been divided into three sections. Infrastructure Financing deals with REITS, INVITs and ways to enhance financing of projects and municipal bond markets.<\/p>\n It works with various infrastructure ministries on their monetisation plans.<\/p>\n The Sectoral Studies section looks at various issues in sectors like roads, Railways, power, telecom, airports and shipping.<\/p>\n It is also working on new dispute resolution solutions.<\/p>\n The Capacity Building section is tasked with carrying out training of state and central government officials as well as private sector participants on how to push project financing.<\/p>\n The main task of the IFS is the new PPP framework. PPP has had mixed success in India.<\/p>\n While it has worked relatively well for the roads and airport sectors, that has not been the case with shipping, railways, power, oil and gas infra, among others.<\/p>\n A big reason for this has been lack of exit and refinancing options and a dispute-resolution mechanism, which private sector players claimed went against them.<\/p>\n The new PPP framework is expected to resolve these issues with a revamped dispute-resolution mechanism.<\/p>\n It will have effective and investor-friendly guidelines, easier refinancing and credit options, among others.<\/p>\n For FY23, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman has set a record capex target of Rs 7.5 trillion.<\/p>\n