India’s biggest telecom company is going public, and it’s not using the cash to build something new. It’s using it to pay off what it already built.
Jio Platforms filed its draft red herring prospectus on June 19, laying the groundwork for what could become India’s largest IPO ever at approximately $3.8 billion. The company plans to issue up to 27 crore equity shares at a face value of Rs 10 each, with the lion’s share of the proceeds, roughly Rs 27,500 crore (about $3.27 billion), going directly toward repaying external borrowings at its subsidiary Reliance Jio Infocomm.
The debt play
The numbers tell a clear story. As of March 2026, Reliance Jio’s net debt stood at Rs 27,579 crore. That’s already a significant reduction from Rs 45,273 crore just a year earlier in March 2025, a roughly 39% decline. If the IPO proceeds land as planned, the company could essentially zero out its remaining external borrowings in one shot.
A telecom giant with serious scale
