Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) on Sunday announced 1.16 per cent stake sale in Jio Platforms, its digital services subsidiary, to Abu Dhabi Investment Authority for Rs 5,683.50 crore, as it accelerates its debt reduction plan.

This is the eighth investment in Jio Platforms in seven weeks and values the company at Rs 4.91 trillion on equity value basis. So far, RIL has raised Rs 97,885.65 crore through 21.06 per cent stake sale to seven marquee investors, including Facebook and private equity firms like KKR and General Atlantic.

RIL had a net debt of Rs 1.6 trillion as of March end. The company has advanced its debt reduction target and plans to make the firm debt free by December end through mix of stake sale in Jio, cash profit through operations, rights issue, and divestment of 49 per cent share in fuel retailing business to BP.

Earlier this week, the company announced a successful closure of Rs 53,124 crore rights issue and would raise 25 per cent of it (Rs 13,281 crore) this year.

Last December, RIL signed an agreement with Abu Dhabi National Oil Company to explore setting up of an ethylene dichloride plant in the UAE. On Friday, Abu Dhabi government-owned Mubadala picked up 1.85 per cent stake in Jio Platforms for Rs 9,093.60 crore. The ADIA-Jio deal is a third such partnership by RIL with the UAE government entity in the recent months.

“This investment is a strong endorsement of our strategy and India’s potential,” RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani said.

Hamad Shahwan Aldhaheri, executive director of the private equities department at ADIA, said, “Our investment in Jio is a further demonstration of ADIA’s ability to draw on deep regional and sector expertise to invest globally in market leading companies and alongside proven partners.”