Mumbai: The government has notified a more liberal set of guidelines for foreign direct investment in sectors like aviation, commodity exchanges, credit information companies, titanium mining, industrial parks and petroleum and natural gas.

The notification, issued by the department of industrial policy and promotion under the union commerce ministry, has fixed overall FDI limit at 49 per cent, including 23 per cent allowed to FIIs.

The ministry, however, clarified that any single foreign investor cannot hold over 5 per cent of the equity in domestic commodity exchanges.

The government had, in January, announced a new policy for foreign investment in commodity exchanges and had assigned more powers to market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in policy implementation.

The new guidelines are expected to boost overseas investments in commodity bourses like the Multi-Commodity Exchange of India (MCX), National Commodity Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX) and the National Multi-Commodity Exchange of India (NMCE).

The government, while disallowing participation by foreign carriers in the aviation sector, allowed FDI up to 74 per cent through the automatic route for non-scheduled airlines, chartered airlines and cargo airlines. It also allowed up to 100 per cent NRI investment through the automatic route in the aviation sector.

FDI would be allowed up to 100 per cent under the automatic route for setting up industrial parks.

The government also raised foreign equity cap in public sector oil refineries for overseas firms to 49 per cent from the current 26 per cent. The notification also makes it clear that no cabinet approval is necessary if the foreign holding exceeded 26 per cent.

The new guidelines also do away with the condition of compulsory divestment of up to 26 per cent equity in favour of Indian partner(s)/public within five years for actual trading and marketing of petroleum products. 

The notification, however, does not make any change in norms for FDI in real estate. 
 
The government, meanwhile, sought to bring FII investments outside the purview of FDI norms. The de-linking provisions were proposed by the DIPP.