Public faith in UTI not eroded: Sinha

By Our Staff Correspondent

DEHRA DUN, AUG. 4. The Union Finance Minister, Mr. Yashwant Sinha, today called for transparency and greater understanding by Parliamentarians before getting carried away by emotional or political considerations. He was responding to a query on the reported demand for his resignation by the former Union Finance Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, who on the UTI muddle had said that ``he (Sinha) had slept like the king of Rome while it burnt.''

Mr. Sinha said that what was important was that public faith in UTI had not eroded. This was indicated by the absence of large- scale withdrawals by the public. ``I will not resign. Perhaps Mr. Singh will recall that he too did not resign although his period as Finance Minister (1991-96) saw some of the biggest scams. Even now, I do not believe that Mr. Singh would cast such an aspersion. My Government has decided to retain me, and I will abide by the wishes of the Prime Minister,'' he said.

The JPC would go into all relevant aspects of the UTI imbroglio and the new UTI chief was efficient, he said. The others roped in to investigate the issue were all competent and known investigators, and he described the ``shouting'' attitude being adopted by certain Opposition groups as `drama'.

Mr. Sinha, who was here to lay the foundation stones for various Income Tax Department offices, assured the Uttaranchal Chief Minister, Mr. Nityanand Swami, of collateral and multilateral assistance for all need based projects - the power sector being one of them. Describing his task as a challenge, Mr. Sinha said the second stage of economic reforms needed to be debated and made acceptable to the public, before the relevant laws were modified.

Mr. Nityanand Swami thanked Mr. Sinha for accepting all his demands. `` We will route our demands soon through the Planning Commission and hope to get the required funds immediately'', he said.

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