India's Largest Municipal Bond Programme Launched

June 22, 2017

Union Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu has launched India’s largest municipal bond programme.

Salient Highlights

The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) became the first municipal corporation in the country to tap money through municipal bonds in 14 years. The AA+ rated PMC’s municipal bonds raised Rs 200 crore at 7.59 per cent rate at the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE).
This is the first-ever mobilisation of debt capital by a municipal corporation on the BSE BOND platform. This will also be the first issuance since the publication of ‘Issue and Listing of Debt Securities by Municipalities Regulations, 2015’ by Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).
The 10-year bonds will be used by the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) for a Rs 2,300-crore water project. The scheme is aimed at providing water 24×7 for all residents of Pune.
Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) was assisted by the US Department of Treasury to create a debt policy. PMC has also planned to prepare a case study based on its experience and share it with other urban bodies to help them raise money from the bond markets.
Since the bonds do not have any guarantee from the state government, an escrow account has been created to deposit the funds for the comfort of investors.

Municipality Bonds

Municipality bonds can be issued by the city corporations to fund developmental projects. Institutional investors, as well as the public, can buy these bonds. The corporations can use the revenues earned from the developmental projects like Metro rail network to repay the interest and principal on these bonds. These municipal bonds have now been permitted for public offering by SEBI.

Municipal bonds have been in existence in India from the year 1997. Cities such as Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Nashik and Madurai have already issued them. These bonds will help the city corporations to directly raise funds without the help of grants from the state governments or agencies such as World Bank.

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