JSW Steel and Tata Steel again in a tight race, this time for Bhushan Power & Steel

After squaring off for the auction of Bhushan Steel, JSW Steel and Tata Steel now face each other for yet another asset from the Delhi-based Singhal family. This time it is Bhushan Power & Steel.

Both JSW Steel and Tata Steel submitted their bids for Bhushan Power & Steel to Insolvency Resolution Professional (IRP) Mahender Khandelwal at 2 pm on Thursday in Gurgaon.

Though Anil Agarwal's Vedanta, AION Capital and an investor from the Middle-East had expressed interest, none of them eventually put in a bid. ArcelorMittal too had done due diligence on Bhushan Steel & Power but had pulled off from the race in the early round.

Bhushan Steel and Power, owned by Sanjay Singhal, owes Rs 48,000 crore to lenders. Sanjay's younger brother Neeraj and family patriarch Brij Bhushan Singhal are the promoters of Bhushan Steel. The family assets were divided in 2011.

People in the know said that the liquidation value of Bhushan Power and Steel has been set at Rs 10,000 crore and the fair value at Rs 25,000 crore.

At the time of writing, it was unclear if the bids have been opened yet. An executive from the industry said that any bid above Rs 13,000 crore will be unviable.

Once opened, the bids will be studied for compliance and once cleared by the IRP, will be forwarded to the Committee of Creditors.

A winning bid may also land up in the office of Competition Commission of India (CCI) as Bhushan Power & Steel has manufacturing facilities in Odisha where Tata Steel already has its Kalinga Nagar plant. JSW Steel is in the process of setting up a plant in the state. The Sajjan Jindal-led organisation may also add to its Odisha presence if it bags Bhushan Steel, which has operations in the state.

This means that whoever wins Bhushan Power & Steel might stand to dominate the market. But will the dominance be monopolistic? That will be up to the CCI to decide.