The Hindu : MPs come out against sale of profit-making units

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 26, 2003

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MPs come out against sale of profit-making units

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI FEB. 25. The disinvestment policy of the Government came in for further criticism during the discussion on the motion of thanks on the President's address in the Lok Sabha today with both allies and opponents expressing reservations about the sale of profit-making units.

However, in contrast to day one of the discussion when the leader of the Opposition, Sonia Gandhi, and the CPI(M) leader, Somnath Chatterjee, had launched a broadside against the disinvestment policy, the criticism today was guarded with the floor being held mostly by allies of the Government.

Of the view that the process has to be properly explained to the House, M. V.V.S. Murthi of the TDP said the loss-making units ought to be disinvested first before the profit-making companies were sold. Stating that disinvestment was an irreversible process, he explained that his party was not averse to it if it was meant to reduce public debt and also to invest in social and infrastructure sectors.

The Shiv Sena was more categorical with Chandrakant Khaire stating that his party was opposed to disinvestment; particularly of profit-making companies such as HPCL and BPCL. And, according to him, the Shiv Sena's objection to the sale of these oil companies was also influenced by the fact that Maharashtra would be most affected by such a move.

While Raashid Alvi of the BSP said profitable units should not be sold off — a point echoed later by Samata's Brahmanand Mandal — the AIADMK MP, P.H. Pandian, took the line that the Government should take Parliament's sanction before disinvesting companies in which the Government had invested.

The disinvestment issue apart, the discussion today saw Mani Shankar Aiyar of the Congress take the Government to task for its genuflecting before Washington at the Non-Aligned Meeting in Kuala Lumpur instead of articulating the sentiments of Parliament which had wanted to come out with a resolution ahead of the summit.

But he reserved his fire for countering the corruption charges levelled against the Congress by the BJP leader, V. K. Malhotra, on Monday while moving the motion of thanks. According to him, the BJP should not point accusing fingers at others when the NDA Government had three chargesheeted ministers, besides several scam-tainted individuals in the Cabinet. In particular, he was critical of the Government for not taking any action against the former Union Finance Minister, Yashwant Sinha, despite the JPC report on the stock market scam "indicting'' him.

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