Former Finance Minister P Chidambaram said privatisation was not the panacea to government's troubles with the economy.
Privatisation must be done with goals in mind, Chidambaram said, questioning the Modi administration's plan to sell stake in state-run refiner Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. “I can understand if you want to privatise Air India because it is a perpetual loss maker. I cannot run an airline, let a private player come and run, I understand that. Why should we privatise an oil company?”
Their failure to raise revenues is because they don't understand how the macro-economy functions, said the Congress leader in an interview to BloombergQuint.
The government's tax collections have been falling short of expectations as India's economy cools, with growth estimated to fall to its lowest in more than a decade in the fiscal ending March.
Private investment and consumption are the two important engines that will drive the economy, said Chidambaram. Businesses are scared and have lost entrepreneurial spirit as probing agencies have extraordinary powers under the Modi government, he said.
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