thank you, ma'am. Good morning, everyone, and a warm welcome to the Q1 FY27 earnings call of Afcons Infrastructure.

To discuss the results, today we have the management with us, which is represented by Mr. Subramanian Krishnamurthy, the Executive Chairman; Mr.

Srinivasan Paramasivan, the Managing Director; Mr. Ramesh Kumar Jha, the CFO; Mr.

Hitesh Singh, the Head of Corporate Strategy. Now at this point, I'll hand over the floor to the management for the initial remarks and post which we can open the floor for the question-and-answer session.

With that, over to you, sir.

Thank you, Kishan. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

I am Krishnamurthy Subramanian. It's a pleasure to connect with our investors, analysts, stakeholders as we begin a new financial year.

Thank you for joining us today and for your continued support and interest in Afcons Infrastructure Limited. Our financial results and investor presentation for the quarter have been uploaded on the stock exchanges, and I trust you have had the opportunity to review them.

Joining me today are Paramasivan Srinivasan, Managing Director; Ramesh Kumar Jha, CFO; and Mr. Hitesh Singh, Head of Corporate Strategy.

Let me begin with an overview of our financial performance for the quarter. Afcons reported a total income of ₹2,727 crore in Q1 FY27, compared to ₹3,419 crore in Q1 FY26.

EBITDA for the quarter stood at ₹263 crore with an EBITDA margin of 9.6%. Profit after tax was ₹30 crore.

While our financial performance for this quarter was lower than the corresponding period last year, as several of the challenges we encountered during FY26 continued into the first quarter of FY27. In addition, adverse weather conditions affected the progress on certain marine projects, while land handover at a few project sites advanced more slowly than anticipated.

Execution of some fast-track projects also progressed at normal pace due to labor shortages, while a few other projects were impacted by pending clearances. We expect these issues to gradually ease, enabling stronger execution momentum over the coming quarters.

During the quarter, we achieved an important milestone. I am delighted to share that the Mumbai-Pune Expressway Missing Link project was inaugurated on 1st May 2026, marking yet another defining milestone in Afcons' journey of delivering iconic infrastructures for the nation.

The cable-stayed bridge executed by Afcons stands as a centerpiece of this landmark project. Standing as India's tallest road cable-stayed bridge, it's not merely a bridge, but a reflection of Indian engineering capability, determination, and execution excellence under some of the most challenging conditions.

We are proud that the Mumbai-Pune Expressway Missing Link project is yet another example of many complex and technology-challenging infrastructure projects that Afcons has successfully executed over the decades. As we look ahead, we are equally encouraged by the quality of our existing order book, which includes several projects that have the potential to become engineering landmarks in their own right.

This reinforces our confidence in the long-term strength of our project portfolio and our ability to continue delivering world-class infrastructure. Alongside engineering excellence, our commitment to safety remains unwavering.

Safety is a deeply embedded aspect in our culture and continues to be recognized by leading global and domestic institutions. During the quarter, several of our projects received British Safety Council's International Safety Awards with distinction.

These recognitions are meaningful because they validate the high standards of safety, discipline, and operational excellence that we strive to uphold across every Afcons project. Let me now briefly touch upon broader infrastructure environment.

For some time now, geopolitical developments have weighed on infrastructure investments and project award activity across several regions. We remain hopeful that as the geopolitical uncertainties across key regions begin to ease, infrastructure investment and project award activity will gradually regain momentum globally as well as in India.

Against this backdrop, we continue to pursue opportunities that align with our well-established risk management framework across our core markets in Asia, Africa, Middle East, and neighboring geographies. Our approach remains selective and disciplined with a clear focus on sustainable and profitable growth.

As we move through FY27, our priorities remain clear. We will continue to focus on growing order book, improving collections, strengthening cash flows, and further enhancing and strengthening the balance sheet.

These initiatives will provide stronger foundation for our growth and long-term value creation. With that, now I invite our Managing Director, Paramasivan Srinivasan, to share his remarks on the business outlook and operational performance.

Thank you, gentlemen.

Thank you, Mr. Subramanian, and good morning, everyone.

I extend a warm welcome to all our investors, analysts, and participants joining us today. We sincerely appreciate your continued confidence in Afcons and value the engagement you bring to these discussions.

As Mr. Subramanian highlighted, the first quarter of '27 continued to be impacted by some of the factors that affected us during the previous financial year, along with certain execution delays across a few projects due to factors beyond our control.

Liquidity conditions remained tight and collections continued to be moderate during the quarter. We remain actively engaged with our clients at multiple levels to accelerate recoveries and improve cash flows over the coming months.

Coming to profitability, we reported an EBITDA margin of 9.6% during the quarter. The moderation in profitability was primarily due to lower revenues during the quarter.

As turnover improves across projects, we expect profitability to correspondingly improve over the coming quarters. On the operations front, I am pleased to share that both tunnel boring machines for our Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail C2 package successfully commenced their initial tunneling drives as per schedule.

This marks an important milestone for the project, particularly considering the challenges it has encountered over the past year. Having achieved this milestone as planned, we expect the projects to move into its next phase of execution with the TBM main tunneling drives expected to start in the coming months.

Coming to order book, I am pleased to share that we have begun financial year '27 on a positive note with a healthy order inflows of ₹13,290 crore during the first quarter. With these orders, our order book stood at ₹43,290 crore at the end of the quarter, providing strong visibility for future revenues.

As on date, our orders booked for the year stands at ₹15,700 crore, including orders received up to date. With this, there is no order pending to be converted from L1 to that of an order.

The healthy order book positions us well for sustained growth over the medium term. As these projects progressively move into the main execution phases, we expect improved operational momentum and a gradual strengthening of our financial performance.

It is equally encouraging that these orders wins are significant achievements in their own right. The Croatia railway project represents the largest single order ever secured by Afcons, while the Vadhavan Port project provides us with the opportunity to construct the world's second-largest breakwater.

These order wins reflect our strategic intent of focusing on large value, complex jobs without compromising on our risk framework. While this is encouraging, we remain equally focused on securing new orders and further strengthening our order book over the year.

Our teams continue to actively pursue opportunities across both domestic and international projects markets, and we remain confident of achieving our full-year order inflow guidance of ₹30,000 crore. This is supported by our healthy bid pipeline of approximately ₹1.5 lakh crore for the remaining 9 months of financial '27 and ₹3.96 lakh crore for the next 2 years across transportation, marine, hydro, underground, water, urban infrastructure, and industrial infrastructure segments.

The pipeline is well diversified across segments and geographies and consists of projects that align well with our technical strengths and disciplined risk management framework. To conclude, while some of the challenges that affected financial year '26 have continued into the first quarter of the current year, we remain encouraged by the conversion of key orders and opportunities ahead.

We begin this year with a healthy order book, a robust bid pipeline, and a team that has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to deliver complex engineering projects under challenging conditions. As execution across our existing projects gathers pace and recently secured orders move into their main construction phases, we expect a gradual improvement in performance over the coming quarters.

We remain committed to disciplined execution, prudent risk management, and operational excellence, while continuing to pursue opportunities that align with our long-term strategies. With our strong technical capabilities, diversified presence, and proven track record, we remain confident in our ability to navigate the current environment and create sustainable long-term value for all our stakeholders.

Thank you once again for your continued trust and support. I now hand over the call to our Chief Financial Officer, Mr.

Ramesh Jha, to take you through the financial performance in greater detail.

Thank you, sir. Good morning, everyone.

Before talking on the numbers, let me reiterate that company is into business of construction. The margin in a quarter varies based on the nature, type, and quantum of work executed.

Quarterly results may vary in different quarter and may not be indicative of the annual result or trend. Now coming specific on the numbers, in this quarter we have done ₹2,727 crore of total income, which includes other income of ₹56 crore.

This is 20.3% down from the previous year wherein we had done ₹3,419 crore of turnover. This number was also inclusive of the other income.

Q1 execution is on the expected line as in many projects there were lack of work front availability, and generally Q1 remains little bit slow in terms of collection because of most of our customers, being government entity, disburse the annual budget by March and then devote Q1 in planning and budgeting for the next financial year. If we talk from the specific experience of financial year 2026-27 Q1, then we would feel liquidity across market need significant improvement.

Payment-related issues in UP Jal Jeevan Mission is still continuing. We have received small amount of payment based on the completed portion of work.

Also, we have noticed that across the spectrum payments are being stretched for some or the other reason, hence we are maintaining the balance between execution and liquidity. In FY27, we have booked order amounting to ₹15,695 crore till now, taking the pending order book in excess of ₹45,000 crore.

In FY 2027, we are targeting to significantly improve the order booking and improve the balance sheet by collecting some of the stuck receivables. Uncertainty around the economic activity because of war, geopolitical, and related stuff continues, it doesn't make sense for any guidance in terms of growth.

In terms of EBITDA, for the quarter we have done ₹263 crore, which is 9.6%. This number has also come down by 41%.

We had done ₹445 crore of absolute number EBITDA, which was 13% in the previous year quarter one. In our EBITDA calculation, we consider BG commission as part of our operating expenditure, EBITDA what we are talking about is after removal of BG commission as an operating expenditure.

This also includes the other income as part of revenue. We have explained earlier also that arbitration interest, foreign currency exchange gain, and miscellaneous income are recurring and very integral to our business, hence these are factored as other operating income.

For the Q1 period, around ₹57 crore is other operating income which we have factored in EBITDA calculation. In terms of profit before tax, for this period we have done ₹51 crore of profit and which is significantly down.

We had done ₹183 crore of profit before tax in the previous year Q1. Profit after tax is ₹30 crore, which is also significantly down because we had done ₹137 crore of profit after tax in the previous year quarter one.

Profits got impacted because of lower turnover on the overall basis. Margins in the individual progress projects continues to be robust, but because of lower turnover overall, they could not generate sufficient overall contribution to cover the overhead cost and still have sufficient profit what the company traditionally been doing.

We have put a lot of efforts towards reducing cost on the possible revenue, but that has been partially offset by increase in energy, transport, and logistic cost. Talking about the finance cost, in Q1 we have seen higher average borrowing during the quarter.

Because of this, interest cost has gone up. Coupled with this, new interest-bearing advances received during last, say, 12 to 15 months has elevated the interest cost on client advances, taking the overall interest cost up.

Currently, 62% of our advances are interest-free and 38% of the advances are interest-bearing. This year we have booked substantial order, but the corresponding advances has still not come into the company.

A large part of this is from the current orders we have bagged is from international market, which is interest-free, and also the orders what we have received in domestic market, the interest rates are quite low. We expect the interest cost to go down in the coming quarter.

In terms of EBITDA, the depreciation is at ₹83.52 crore, which is 3.06% of the turnover. This quarter the TBM operations were virtually not there, the accelerated depreciation what we charge was not there in the quarter.

In terms of tax, the rate is quite high if we see the PBT vis-a-vis profit after tax, the tax rate is working out almost 40%. This is primarily because on Afcons standalone profit what we are paying 25% tax.

However, in consolidated profit this has decreased due to some of the closed project which is in JVs and subsidiary where minor administrative expenses and provisions leading to small losses. This has got amplified in this quarter because of lower profit in Afcons.

As a result, the tax charge represent a higher percent. Also, few JVs pay tax rate in the range of 35% to 36%.

Second, in some of the overseas locations like Bangladesh, tax is charged on turnover. In such situation, if you don't make profit above the threshold, your tax deductions needs to be charged off.

Because Afcons' profit was lower, the administrative expenses leading to lower profitability in those entities, the overall tax rate has gone up. In terms of ROCE and ROE, we'll talk on the annual number only because it doesn't make sense at this point in time.

Specific on the net working capital, the net working capital is at a elevated level because of funding to the projects and no material movement in collection of the blocked-up asset. We are witnessing delays in certification of the work done and release of payment in projects.

This has led to increase in uncertified work done leading to jump in working capital requirement. Generally, this trend remains in Q1, but we were expecting some improvement in this quarter, but the collections have not moved to a level where we would have expected.

However, management is rigorously working towards stuck collection and we are confident to turn things around this year. In terms of debt, in Q1 payment issue has continued and we had to fund the operations.

Also, we have done sizable capex payment this quarter, debt has moved to a higher number. On net debt basis, the debt-to-equity is around 0.68 times of the net worth.

On behalf of Afcons, I thank everyone for attending this call. Now I request the moderator to open the floor for question and answers.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. In the opening remarks, we spoke about some of the execution challenges getting addressed over the next couple of quarters.

Just wanted to check, are we seeing some concrete evidence of that? Are we seeing execution pace picking up across multiple projects, or at this stage it is a bit of a hope?

At this stage, we are definitely seeing the symptoms of it's all happening. Some of the issues with respect to land-related issues are getting addressed by proactive activities undertaken by Maharashtra government.

That would result in significant release of lands. Whichever places are there, there have been regular reviews from the government, which helps in pushing the project ahead.

Similarly in Madhya Pradesh where we have a project also where there is a compensation-related issue is getting resolved shortly. Movement has happened.

There also, out of two projects, one project will start moving up immediately. That is what we look.

Therefore, the execution-related challenges with respect to blocked-up things is more or less getting over. With geopolitical issues is becoming a little improved as compared to the last quarter, I would put things in terms of movement of materials, though it's a little expensive as compared to the earlier period, it would still be improved in terms of movement of materials for our overseas projects.

With these two, we do expect there are clear indications that things are moving towards positivity. Q3 and Q4, we believe, would see significant uptick.

Perfect,

perfect. That's great to hear, sir.

My next question is on some of the large projects that we are having, like the Croatia project, the Vadhavan project. For these two projects, when should we expect work to start?

Is it that the initial part would be more about designing, and to that extent there'll be lesser revenue accretion, and only over a period of time these projects should be picking up pace, if you could kind of indicate us the execution timelines around that? A related question is on the HSR project.

How should we think about that in terms of receiving payments in respect of past work that is done and execution pace from here on? Thank you so much.

With respect to Croatia, we believe the current year there'll be a miniscule expenditure and next financial year onwards, Croatia will pick up. With respect to Vadhavan project, alternative methods are being discussed with the client.

Currently, the approach road and also the reclamation-related work is yet to be completed. You would have read in the newspaper about the agitation and all around that.

We are working with the client proactively with the thing. Current year, it'll only be a geotechnical investigation and related design-related work and initial installations, that will only happen in Vadhavan.

All others, there are also aggressive push from the government also to see that certain facilities or certain approaches are handed over to us so that we can start the work. Therefore, in both the projects, effectively current year there'll be miniscule turnover.

With respect to HSR, whatever turnover we have done, all these have been paid for regularly. The tunneling-related turnover will commence from November technically.

Till that time, the initial drive will happen for about 3 months. After that, we do expect a good turnover.

As we had conveyed earlier also, tunneling carries higher level of turnover. Therefore, as we start tunneling deeper, we'll get into the turnover properly.

We are in the final stages of getting the settlement with respect to force majeure done, and most likely it'll get settled in the current quarter.

Perfect, sir. That's great to hear.

Thank you so much.

Thanks, Aditya.

Hi, sir. A couple of questions.

I was listening your opening comments and the reply to the first participant questions. Let me break it into two, three parts.

Do we see Q2 revenue be a Q-o-Q flat or a lower? Then when we are saying the H2 would be a better execution, I understand though we are not providing a full-year guidance on the execution front, but on a directional front, even if let's assume a 20% kind of a growth, is it possible or not?

Even if that is possible, then for full year, my calculation says we will be a kind of a flattish or maybe a 1% kind of a growth. That's the correct way to look at, or we can see maybe a 5% plus kind of a degrowth for this year?

See, we have we have already talked about that at this point in time, it doesn't make any sense to give any direction on the top line or any profitability-related guidance. We are not commenting on the Q2 how it is going to pan out or how the year is going to pan out.

As things stand, things are moving in our whatever expectations we have. We aspire that we we should, build a very strong order book in this financial year and we should also improve the balance sheet this year by way of collecting, by way of reducing our contract assets and receivable, and by reducing our debt.

We should be in a very strong position by end of the year in terms of order booking, in terms of financial health, and then we should ramp up the progress in the year financial year '28.

Sir, I understand, but still again harping on the same thing because when we are saying that in H2 we should see a strong execution,

my

point, sir, listen to me, sir. My point is that because if we will be a doing a kind of a flat, even if I take a 20% kind of a growth in the second half and maybe a flat in the Q2, that means this would be the fourth year where we will be kind of a having a flat revenue from what we have done in the FY23.

From there till now, we will be having a kind of a flat growth. At the same time, at the PAT level, we will be drawing a declining.

Will FY28 then or maybe a '28 and the '29 would be so strong, maybe a kind of a 25%, 30% kind of a growth that we are looking at? That's directionally wanted to understand.

Just to answer you, in past if we see the performance of the company, in generally the Q1 is around, say, 40%, 45% and Q2 remains to be around H1 remains to be around 40%, 45% and H2 remains around 55% to 60%. Directionally, if you ask me, we are looking at a similar kind of a situation this year also.

Q3, Q4 is going to be where we'll bounce back to the levels we were generating earlier. In terms of, as the order booking is ramping up and the way we are targeting to reach in terms of financial health, we are looking at a strong FY28 and FY29.

Great. Sir, is it possible to share couple of balance sheet data points?

Because we have mentioned that I think the debt would have also increased. If you can specify particularly the gross debt and then the cash level and also some of the inventory, trade payable, debtor absolute numbers, and maybe mobilization advance, retention, unbilled, so that will help us to understand how the things are either worsening or maybe at a similar level.

That would be helpful.

See, generally the balance sheet numbers are disclosed in H1, maybe in September we'll be coming out with the detailed numbers, you'll be able to figure out. In terms of Q1 numbers, generally we have seen almost say last 10, 15 years we have seen that Q1 numbers will be always lower than the number of annual number, March number.

This is the trend. In terms of absolute debt number, we have talked about that the debt-to-equity is around 0.68 on net debt-to-equity basis.

Numbers have slightly gone down as compared to the March number. The way deterioration happened in terms of, say, receivables or debt number or, say, contract assets number in last year Q1, this year it has not gone that bad.

Sir, unless we give some directional numbers would be difficult to kind of a quantify what we are saying. At least a gross debt level, what's the gross debt number, and working capital days, what was in FY26 and now how much increase has happened?

At least See, it is

It is at a It is a at a elevated elevated level as compared to March number, but since, we have the auditors have not certified the balance sheet number, it will not be prudent on our part to, give those numbers.

Because all other companies also provide, I understand it is unaudited number, but at least to get a sense and how one can pencil in the numbers. Unless we have anything on that front it becomes a very, very difficult to kind of a pencil in how one can look at the full year and maybe the next year.

A diplomatic answer would be a difficult to kind of a convert into the numbers. That's my suggestion, thanks.

See,

you will be able to calculate these numbers. You look at the March debt number, you look at the March net worth number, and what we are saying that at this point in time the debt-to-equity on a net debt basis is around 0.68, you will be able to calculate.

It's very simple. I'm not spelling out because those numbers have not been audited, it is not advisable that we talk about on a public forum these numbers.

That's the reason. You'll be able to very easily calculate.

Working capital days, sir, we are not saying anything directional also, how much, 10, 20 days increase, something?

It has marginally increased from the March number.

Okay. Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Good morning, sir. Thank you so much for the opportunity.

Sir, our execution strategy to prioritize liquidity over maximizing quarterly revenue, basically limiting execution on projects with elongated payments. At the same time, we are focusing on reducing the net debt in this financial via contract asset liquidations.

How we are managing this duality, whether slowing down new work to protect cash flow while simultaneously executing existing work to unlock cash, because our order inflow is also more than ₹13,000 crore in this quarter. I'm trying to understand on the execution side, how we are prioritizing our existing work as well as new work.

You are right that it's a very difficult situation where we need to manage the execution as well as we need to manage liquidity and we are not unduly overexposing ourselves with some of the customers. This approach we are not approaching with all the customers.

There are certain customers where we had seen that there were some challenges in those project, and in those projects only we are taking such kind of stand like, say, project in Bangladesh or some water-related project. We are giving funds to the project based on the collection that project is generating.

Otherwise, excluding these projects, the payments are forthcoming, the projects' cash flows are positive, such projects we are supporting with wherever there is a temporary mismatch and if there is any requirement for the completion of the project.

Sir. Sir, our strategic equipment base is nearly ₹4,300 crore, I think, which creates high depreciations as well as maintenance burden.

If you look at last few years, our top lines anywhere between ₹10,000 to ₹13,000 crore range, but if you look at our interest cost and depreciation, it's substantially increased. Is there any thought process to strategic shifting towards asset-light model where you can lease specialized equipments or to form a JV with equipment providers for some specific mega projects?

Thereby, we can improve ROE and ROCE profiles. What's your thought process on owning most of the equipments as well as moving towards leasing or renting the equipments?

For strategic equipments only, we keep investing. We don't invest in all the equipments, number one.

Number two, as we had explained in the past also, outside of India, especially in Africa and all, the cost of rentals are very high. A equipment value is sought to be realized in 9 months' time in Africa, as opposed to some 48 to 60 months in India.

Therefore, in some of those cases also, we do invest equipments on the higher side and we get commensurate returns as well. Third, in marine, we hold strategic advantage by having a large fleet of equipments.

That is something which helps us in bagging of marine projects and other thing. Only thing, as last couple of years our turnover has stagnated or slightly degrown, it creates an impression that it is on the higher side.

It is not so. As we move forward, you will find that we have a asset turnover ratio also significantly improved.

We have not invested in any assets which is not of strategic importance.

Got it, sir. Thank you.

Thank you.

Sir, thanks for the opportunity. My question is first on the pipeline.

You mentioned about 1.5 trillion for the next 9 months. Can you break that across the segments?

Sure. For the 9 months out of this ₹1.5 lakh crore, major chunk is from urban infrastructure, which for us comprises of metro and elevated bridges and elevated roads, that is around 34%; marine is 32%; hydro and underground is 20%, it includes our water business as well; surface, which is road and railway business, that is 14%, and this pipeline is for the next 9 months.

Understood. Sir, any color on the long-term pipeline?

You mentioned about 3.9 trillion.

Sure. On the long-term pipeline, as MD sir mentioned in his speech, our long-term pipeline is close to ₹4 lakh crore.

In this part also, the pipeline is evenly distributed. Around 36% is from the urban infrastructure space and surface transport will be around 20%.

The hydro business will be relatively less, it's around 15%, and remainder will be marine and industrial.

Understood. Sir, can you give some details on the urban project, which are the big ticket projects that are coming in the near term?

Some of the big ticket projects if we can talk about is Brahmaputra Tunnel is something which is coming up, which is around ₹19,000 crore. There is Dholera connectivity in Ahmedabad, which is about ₹18,000 crore.

Many other projects of the sizes of elevated expressways and other things are coming in excess of all around ₹4,000 to ₹5,000 crore. There are number of bridges which are coming up, which is also in the region of between ₹3,000 to ₹5,000 crore.

We have a strong pipeline in the domestic market, and similarly in the international market also, there's quite a good pipeline available to us.

Understood. Sir, my last question is on the depreciation of TBM.

How will that be accounted for?

TBM, we are accounting for as per the Companies Act prescribed rate, and we'll continue to account for those depreciations.

Understood. Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Hi. Good afternoon and thanks for taking my question.

Couple of questions from my side. First, what was the capex that we undertook in Q1?

Capex,

in Q1 we have done close to ₹150 crore capitalized, but then there is a sizable amount in CWIP.

Possible to quantify that, or would that be more or less same as what it was at the end of March, I think we had almost ₹900 crore of CWIP, if I'm correct?

Similar number is there.

Got it. On the order intake front, we already have won about 15 odd thousand crore this year.

For the year as a whole, fair to say somewhere around 30 odd thousand crore is something that we can look at?

Yes, ₹30,000 crore we are very confident of booking at the minimum.

Sure. Last question to Ramesh, our other income, which you mentioned about 57 odd crore this year, now I assume forex gains, etc., everything is included in that.

For the year as a whole, what kind of number that could be? Because it has come down.

We used to have almost about 450, 470 odd crore of forex gain earlier. Now it's reduced, what number could it be?

What number you are talking about in other income around ₹450, ₹470 crore, it used to be a combination of these factors, like say arbitration interest, foreign currency gain, and the miscellaneous income, and some of the other stuffs also, like insurance claim and other stuff. Now, for this quarter the number is low because we also try to close things in March wherever possible and the activity also goes up in H2.

This year also we'll be in the range of, say, for the year somewhere around 400 or so.

Sure. Thanks and all the best.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi. Thanks for the opportunity.

Sir, just on the order inflow front, because you have already seen the order inflows, what is the upside risk that will overshoot the 30,000 order inflow target for FY27?

I would say that first let us achieve the ₹30,000 crore, then we will see what is the upside we are in a position to make it. Currently we are at 16,000 and we hope as we proceed, we will be in a position to guide you better.

Today's guidance is ₹30,000 crore.

Understood, sir. Sir, another question that I had was the overseas project that we are undertaking, between a domestic project and overseas project, which is likely to have a better margin profile?

I understand that it's dependent on the bidding and etc., but typically what's the margin differential between overseas and domestic project, if you could give a sense on that?

In overseas project, we generally make better margin. The delta in, say, domestic versus overseas is around 200 to 300 basis points, which is higher in overseas market.

Whatever project we are targeting in overseas market, specific margin will not be able to give you what margin we generally target, but then domestic market vis-a-vis overseas market, the margins are better in the overseas market.

Understood, sir. Those are my two questions.

Thanks for the opportunity and all the best for the coming quarters.

Thank you.

Sir, thanks for the opportunity. Sir, in terms of our profit and loss account, what could be the reasons for decline in the depreciation?

Any link with the revenue that we book or what the reason behind that?

No, sir. Depreciation, there is no link to the revenue because generally depreciation is a time-related cost.

The number has come down because, as I explained in the opening commentary, in this period we did not had too much of tunneling-related activity. We have explained in past that we used to do accelerated depreciation on the tunnel boring machine basis the running meter it used to excavate.

This period hardly there was any TBM-related tunneling activity. That is why the number has come down.

No,

which means it is linked with the revenue, right?

No, it is linked with the revenue only to the extent of TBM, which was not there in this quarter.

Fine. Second thing is in terms of execution, you did clarify in previous questions, but if one has to pinpoint, our order book is relatively young, initial stage, and execution could pick up as the quarter progresses, and that is one thought.

Another is probably there are delays in the payment from the client, and as the clients are delaying, you're not able to pull the money or probably deploy the money back in the working capital and another things which could improve execution. Which one directionally you will pinpoint the reason of muted execution?

See,

as we explained that the order book, whatever we have booked till now, say around ₹16,000 crore of order, these orders to convert in revenue it will take some time. The order what we were having in hand on say around ₹32,000 crore, in such project there were couple of project which were moving slow and then in some of the other projects there were some land acquisition related issues or there were some change in scope related stuff, the work fronts were not available.

Because of that, there was a muted revenue in this quarter. As things stand, we expect the execution to significantly pick up from Q3 onwards.

We'll have a very strong H2. All these orders whatever we have booked and the balance period in this year whatever orders we are going to book, we'll have a very sizable order booking in our hand matured for construction for the next financial year, FY28.

That's where we are looking at that FY28 we'll have a sizable ramp-up in terms of execution.

Sure. Sure, sir, and thanks for the answers, and I'll come back in the queue, sir.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, sir. Sir, my question is regarding the cash flow from operations.

Is it negative for this quarter also?

I didn't get the question. What is that?

Sir, cash flow from operations, is it negative for this quarter also?

Cash flow from operations generally in Q1 remains to be negative, because in past also we have explained that customers what they try to do is they will try to release all the up to date payment in March quarter. Q1 they devote their time for planning and budgeting for the next financial year.

There is less activity in Q1 from the customer and payment also remains to be slow in Q1. Cash flow is negative.

Sir. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. Sir, my question is regarding our JJM order book and receivables.

Can you quantify the amount of the orders pending in our order book and how much receivables we are still yet to receive?

In Jal Jeevan Mission, all put together we have got ₹1,221 crore of total order, in which from the UP the balance order is ₹510 crore, Madhya Pradesh is ₹414 crore, and Rajasthan is ₹297 crore. Amongst this, in Madhya Pradesh we are not having any major problem, because whatever work we are executing, we are getting paid.

In Rajasthan also, payments are partly coming. Major problem is in UP, where recent time they have started making payment, because wherever we have completed the last-mile connectivity, the payments have started flowing in, but then it is not that significant, corresponding to the receivable we have.

In past also we have explained that in UP we were having close to ₹400 crore of receivable, from there we have received a very small fraction. For all practical purposes, the receivable remains to be in the similar level.

Understood, sir. What will be the unbilled amount, sir?

This amount what we are talking about is a combination of receivable plus unbilled.

Understood, sir. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks for taking my question. Sir, we have very good order book position, but over the last few years we are facing execution problem or some different type of problem, maybe land and everything different.

What's the problem or how we are managing or going to increase the turnover or execution level, or what percentage of the sizable order is slow moving? Can you explain or bifurcate it?

See,

we have explained in the last quarter earnings call on some of the issues which has been factored in. If you look at the overall order book value, roughly around 5.65% is slow moving category, and Bangladesh orders constitute about 2%, and another about 3% constitutes Jal Jeevan Mission orders.

These three put together, roughly around 11% is what we can categorize are either slow moving or otherwise. In some of the other cases, as we had explained, there have been the right of way and related issues, which is getting resolved.

That is why we are saying the third and fourth quarter it will pick up better. With the proactive involvement of Government of Maharashtra, there have been a lot of improvements in such areas, which in the past had contributed a bit.

Now with the proactive involvement, things are getting resolved and projects will be available for execution. Otherwise, we have already started in the water portion and other things.

Land portion also we will commence in the second half of the year. With that, things will improve.

When nearly about 11% of the orders are slow moving or other thing, and another roughly about 20% of the orders are in the initial phase, then that is where there are challenges in terms of converting it into turnover, which will start improving in the second half year. Sir,

as stated in the call, sir, we do plan to reduce our debt over the years by the March. What is the size we are seeing to reduce our debt?

Debt we will look at a sizable reduction. This year, as we said that we had to make payment for some of the capital equipment we have bought, despite all that we'll see improvement the number what we have clocked in FY26, from that number we will see some improvement.

At least, there'll be some 5% to 10% improvement from that number.

Can you quantify?

We are looking at debt closing say around 3,500 or so.

It will be reduced by how much as a consolidated level, around 300 to 400 crore?

No, what we are talking about, from FY26 debt number, we are looking at a similar number, but then this year we will be making payment close to, say, around ₹700 to ₹800 crore towards capex. Despite that, we'll clock the similar number on the debt front.

In terms of working capital, the similar amount of improvement will be there.

This 100,

yeah. See, what I was trying to explain that the debt number in absolute terms will be similar number what we have clocked in March '26.

Since we'll be doing a sizable capex this year, in working capital we will see the improvement. That's where I was saying that we'll see around 5% to 10% improvement in working capital, that is bare minimum.

Net debt will be reduced by 700 crore, or it will be lower than that?

Net debt will be somewhere around, say, ₹2,700, ₹2,800 crore kind of a number. Right.

Thank you, sir. Thank you and best wishes for current year.

Thank you.

Hi. Thanks for the opportunity for the follow-up question.

Just one understanding I wanted to have. Regarding this JV losses and higher taxes that you were mentioning about, how are they accounted in the P&L statement?

Just wanted an understanding on that.

You are asking about JV accounting or you are asking about the JV tax?

Tax basically, why the tax went up this year this quarter. Just wanted to understand where that part is accounted in the P&L statement.

See,

it goes as a tax in whatever JV pays tax, that goes as a tax in the respective entity. Then in consolidation, that forms part of tax, because most of these JVs are forming part of the standalone financial itself, it gets incorporated in standalone financials as well.

Now, specifically I was trying to explain for this quarter, because in Afcons the profitability was low, in terms of percentage it is appearing to be around, say, 40%. The amount if you see per se is not that big number, it is around, say, ₹4, ₹5 crore.

Had we had maybe, say, a ₹150, ₹200 crore kind of a profit in Afcons, what we were clocking for so many quarters, this ₹4 crore will not make that tax percentage a big number.

Okay. In that case, sir, tax would have also gone up, right?

This wouldn't have been a fixed number, right, this ₹4 crore that you're saying, that would have also gone up in that case. Just wanted a bit more clarity on that.

No, see, in Afcons most of the entities we are making tax payment in the range of 25% or so. Just because that this quarter in some of the entities, some of the closed projects entity, we had to incur some administrative cost, because in such entities we are following up with customer for collections and some other closure aspects are not closed, and in such entities we are required to make ECL provision on the receivables.

Because of that, in those entities we are looking at a loss kind of a situation, because the projects are completed. All these administrative expenses, ECL provisions are coming as a only cost, and because of that the consolidated profitability is coming down, and this whatever loss we are incurring in these entities, because of that the tax rate is going up despite paying, say, 25%, 26% tax only.

Got it, that's clear. Thank you.

Thanks for answering the questions.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. Thank you for the opportunity again.

Sir, for capex, you said in this quarter we have done a 150 crore capex, but on the cash flow front, this number must be on the higher side.

Yes. Because some of the amount which was on 31st March, which was on CWIP, for that we had to make payment in the quarter.

For full year FY27, we are looking at 700, 800 crore capex?

Yes.

For next year, given till now whatever the orders that we have bagged, what broader number one can look at in terms of the capex for FY28?

In FY28, we are looking at capex in the range of, say, ₹600, ₹650 crore.

Okay. Given the depreciation, as you said, maybe the from November when the TBM full-fledged will start, even in Q2, the similar kind of a 83, 85 crore kind of a depreciation should be there.

For full year, how much one can look at in terms of the lower depreciation versus FY26 of 454 crore?

Because

even if we take up 83 crore this quarter and the next quarter also similar number, 160, and then even if it picks up to 130 odd crore, then also this number is it fair to say should be close to a 400 odd crore or even less than that? See,

we'll not be able to give you that number, but then maybe for all practical purposes you can consider FY26 depreciation number. Okay.

For finance cost, this quarter and the ECL provision, was there any ECL provision in this quarter? On the finance cost, how one can look at the finance cost?

As far as ECL provisioning is concerned, we have explained last time that we have made a framework for ECL provisioning, and which was approved by the board and we had taken professional guidance from experts in this particular field, and basis that framework was devised, and basis that framework we have started making provisioning from last year, and we continue to do the provisioning on that basis. No specific provision as such in any project, because we believe that any such eventuality we don't foresee any such eventuality going forward.

Whatever project-specific provisioning we had to do last time, on a company basis if we evaluate, let's say, last 20, 25 years, maybe those were aberrations, because such instance we never had. It was maybe, say, at max I can say 1%, 2% kind of a possibility.

We don't foresee going forward such kind of provisioning will be required. Then on a prudent basis, we have made a very robust provisioning mechanism and taking guidance from professionals, and basis that we have been making provision.

As far as finance cost is concerned, as we said that the debts are higher than what was in the March. In terms of client advances, the interest-bearing advances continues to be on the similar level what we were having for, say, last three, four quarters, similar number.

The finance costs are also on the similar lines. In terms of average borrowing cost, if you ask me, we have brought it down, we have significantly brought it down.

Many high cost debts we have replaced with low cost debt. From operational aspects, whatever control on things we have, we have done our bit, and that's where, despite debt going up, the finance costs has not significantly gone up.

Once we see improvement in collection and all, we'll see a marked reduction in the finance cost.

Lastly, in Q1 revenue, can you break it down into domestic and international, what would be the share? See,

in terms of revenue from overseas market, as in March we had shown that the overseas revenue had come down to around 13%. In Q1 we are having overseas revenue around 16% from overseas market, domestic is 84%.

Now the order mix is changing. At the moment, the order book what we have, we have moved back to around, say, 25% from overseas market, and there are a lot of other projects in overseas market we are expecting.

We hope that we'll go back to 30% from overseas market, that is for minimum. Then as the order book moves 30% from overseas market, revenue also will go back to 30% from the overseas market.

Balance whatever we are looking at close to 14, 15 thousand crore kind of order inflow, there also one can say sizable should be from the international market, overseas?

Yes.

Yes. Thank you and all the best, sir.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. Thanks for your continued support, and we look forward to an exciting period ahead.

Thank you all.