Some State governments tend to have a “duality” in their approach towards the strategic disinvestment of public sector enterprises even as they go all out to attract private investors by holding large investment summits with offers of land parcels and myriad sops, a top Finance Ministry official flagged on Monday.
The comments assume significance, coming a month after the Centre was compelled to drop a plan to privatise the Salem Steel Plant, a unit of SAIL, due to lack of bidder interest in the absence of co-operation from the Tamil Nadu government, which didn’t even enable potential bidders to enter the plant and assess its worth.
“State governments, in general, have a very lukewarm response to strategic disinvestment,” Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) Secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey told The Hindu. “I think we need to engage more proactively with them. In general, if we are really saying that we are encouraging private sector participation, I think to that extent, there is a little bit of duality in the process there,” he added.
