New Delhi: The Planning Commission on Wednesday pitched for "aggressive" disinvestment, and said the proceeds from sale of government shares in public sector undertakings should be utilised for new investment projects.
"First of all we should be aggressive and secondly it (proceeds from disinvestment) should be used for new investment," Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia told reporters at the Economic Editors' Conference here.
The modalities for expediting disinvestment and
utilising the proceeds in new projects should be developed by
the Finance Ministry, he said when asked whether the receipts
should be used for bridging fiscal deficit which is expected
to soar to 6.8 per cent of the GDP during 2009-10.
Under the current dispensation, the proceeds of
disinvestment are parked in National Investment Fund (NIF) and
the funds are used for financing social sector schemes and
capital requirement of the PSUs. The NIF has a corpus of Rs
1,815 crore, mainly raised by offloading shares of the Power
Grid Corporation in the last fiscal.
The government had already offloaded the shares of the
Oil India Limited (OIL) and NHPC in the current fiscal, and
has unveiled plans to reduce its shareholding in NTPC, Sutluj
Jal Vidyut Nigam and Rural Electrification Corporation.
During the current fiscal, the government raised Rs
2,013 crore by offloading its shares in the hydro-power major
NHPC and Rs 2,247 crore from stake sale in OIL.
As per the disinvestment policy of the UPA, the
government is committed to offloading equity in public sector
undertakings while retaining 51 per cent stake.
"The public sector undertakings are the wealth of the
nation, and part of this wealth should rest in the hands of
people. While retaining at least 51 per cent government equity
in our enterprises, I propose to encourage people's
participation in our disinvestment programme", Finance
Minister Pranab Mukherjee had said in his budget speech in
July.
Bureau Report