Bhubaneswar:National Aluminium Company Limited (Nalco), the Navratna PSU, under Ministry of Mines, Govt. of India, has declared an interim dividend of 56%, i.e. Rs.2.80 per share of Rs.5/- each, amounting to Rs.541.22 crore for the financial year 2016-17, on the paid-up equity share capital of Rs.966.46 crore. This is the highest-ever dividend declared by the company since inception. The union minister for mines,  Piyush Goyal, was presented a cheque, amounting to Rs.403.62 crore by Nalco CMD Tapan Kumar Chand in the presence of  union mines secretary Arun Kumar and mines ministry joint secretary  Subhash Chandra as interim dividend on the 74.58% shares held by the Govt of India, in New Delhi on March 21, 2017.

Nalco, which started its commercial operations in 1987 has been earning profits consistently and has been declaring dividends since 1992. In 2015-16 fiscal, the company had declared a total dividend of Rs.467.13 crore.  It may be mentioned that since inception, Nalco has paid a total of Rs.6365 crore as dividend including Rs.5371 crore as share of Govt. of India.