Selling PSUs not in interest of the masses: Stalin

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin. File pic

Privatisation of Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) is not in national interest and the Tamil Nadu government would oppose the Centre's move, Chief Minister M K Stalin informed the State Assembly on Thursday. The PSUs of India are public assets that are designed to nurture economic growth and provide job opportunities and these are the bedrock of small and micro enterprises, Stalin said.

"The public sector companies are common property and they are important for small businesses, economic growth and generation of employment in our country. In our view, it is not in the national interest to sell or lease out public sector enterprises that operate in the interest of the people, not for profit alone," he added.

The public sector units functioned considering larger public good and welfare and an objective of profit alone is not the goal of such enterprises, he added. Hence, the Chief Minister said he would write to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to express his government's opposition to the union government following a trend towards privatisation of PSUs, he said.

Prime Minister Modi had months ago said that the "government has no business to be in business." Barring four strategic areas, the Centre had said that it was for privatisation of PSUs in all the other sectors.

This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever