Pantaloon Retail will be rebranded Future Retail

**New Delhi:**Future Group firm Pantaloon RetailIndia Ltd (PRIL) today said the company’s board has approvedchange in the company’s name to ‘Future Retail India Ltd’.

PRIL’s board that met today also approved issue of 800optionally fully convertible debentures of Rs one crore eachaggregating to Rs 800 crore on preferential basis to AdityaBirla Nuvo Ltd or its subsidiary Peter England Fashion andRetail Ltd, the company said in a filing to the BSE.

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The board has also recommended issue of equity sharesworth over Rs 199.99 crore to Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd.The board recommended issue of over 81.63 lakh equityshares of Rs two each at a price of Rs 245 per shareaggregating to over Rs 199.99 crore on preferential basis toBennett Coleman & Co. Ltd, it said.

“The relevant date for the pricing of the aforesaidpreferential issues is 29 April 2012,” the filing said.

Bennett Coleman & Co’s stake in PRIL will go up to 5.7 percent after the issue from earlier around 2.4 percent.On 30 April, Future Group had announced hiving offapparel stores chain ‘Pantaloon’ from PRIL and selling up to50.01 percent stake in the format to Aditya Birla Nuvo Ltd(ABNL) for Rs 800 crore.

In addition, ABNL will also take care of Rs 800 croreworth liability of PRIL. As a part of the deal between the twocompanies, the Pantaloon format will be demerged from PRIL, alisted entity on the BSE and the NSE.

An Extraordinary General Meeting of the company will beheld on 30 May 2012 at Mumbai for obtaining shareholders’approval for the preferential issue of the equity shares anddebentures, the filing added.

Shares of PRIL’s today closed at Rs 184.85 pershare, up1.01 percent over their previous close on the BSE.

PTI