Disinvestment of 26 per cent shares of State-owned public sector undertakings (PSUs) has been mooted for mobilising Rs.1,000 crore to rein in the revenue deficit and also fund the flagship projects of the State government.
Finance Department has put forward the disinvestment proposal on the premise of enhancing managerial efficiency of the PSUs and also mobilising resources to meet the development needs of the government. The proposal has been worked out in conformity with the Central government’s disinvestment policy.
The State government has been advised to religiously toe the Central government’s line and work out a planned disinvestment course to contain the budgetary outflows for PSUs and also meet the target within the next financial year.
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In order to protect the government interests, it has been proposed to limit the disinvestment to 26 per cent. The process should be according to the guidelines laid out by the Union Ministry for Disinvestment, Securities ad Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and Ministry for Corporate Affairs. Constitution of a committee headed by Planning Board Vice Chairman K.M. Chandrasekhar and also comprising the Additional Chief Secretary (Finance), Principal Secretary (Planning and Economic Affairs), Principal Secretary (Industries) and Member-Secretary (Public Sector Restructuring and Internal Audit Board) has been suggested for working out the disinvestment strategy.
According to the Review of Public Sector Enterprises released by the Bureau of Public Enterprises in January which covered 93 PSUs, they have an invested capital of Rs.28,818 crore and an accumulated loss of Rs.7,593.11 crore. At present, there are substantial outflows as financing for capital projects under the budget of the State or as loans provided under various loan heads in the budget.
Absence of a professional management and the intrinsic unviable nature of the operations have been cited as the main reasons for the poor performance of PSUs.
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Instead of instilling professionalism for improving the efficiency of PSUs, unbundling of shares has been proposed as an option for streamlining their functioning and mopping up resources. Though the government had not yet taken a call on the proposal, if it decided to go ahead, it would have far-reaching consequences and set a wrong precedent, sources said.