Govt open to privatising some loss-making PSUs: Jaitley
FMSPEAK Easier land rules, coal-auction type policy for other minerals on anvil
NEW DELHI: India is open to privatisation of certain loss-making state-owned companies, finance minister Arun Jaitley said on Wednesday, promising more initiatives including reforms in the mineral sector along the lines of the recently-announced plans of coal block auction.
The government also plans to open railways further to private investment, ease restrictive land purchase rules, relax labour laws and raise the foreign investment ceiling for insurance companies, Jaitley said.
“Certainly, I would be interested to look at some PSUs (which) could do much better in private hands,” Jaitley told delegates at the India Economic Summit organised by the World Economic Forum and Confederation of Indian Industry on Wednesday. “Taxpayers can’t continue to pay for loss-making businesses.”
For now, however, the government will stick to selling minority stake in profit-making public sector undertakings (PSUs).
In September, the government had approved share-sale plans in three major PSUs — Coal India Ltd, NHPC and ONGC — that can potentially earn the exchequer `44,000 crore. Revenues from selling shares in PSUs is critical to the government’s plans to keep the fiscal deficit — amount of money the government borrows to fund its expenses — at 4.1% of GDP in 2014-15. Jaitley added that some allegations of “crony capitalism” were true under last government, an element of fairness in the system was lacking, such as in the case of coal blocks allocation.
Last month, the government had announced plans to put up coal mines for bidding by private steel, power and cement compa-