Nirmala Sitharaman: Disinvestment will now gain lot of momentum

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday said the pace of disinvestment will now gain a lot of momentum, and those which have already found cabinet approval will be taken up with all earnestness.

Speaking on Day 1 of ASSOCHAM Foundation Week, via video conferencing, Sitharaman said: "You would have seen in the last two months the pace in which the two major disinvestment related activities, and also the others which are relatively bringing down the government share in some of the big public sector undertakings, are also simultaneously happening. The pace of disinvestment will now gain a lot of momentum and those which have already found cabinet approval will be taken up with all earnestness."

"Disinvestment will be happening, corporatisation of not just the defence, DRDO related labs but also banks - where I want them to run a lot more professional, they should also be able to raise money from the market," she said.

Sitharaman said that the Union Budget for 2021-22 would emphasise on sustaining high public expenditure on infrastructure to revive the economy.

"We shall definitely sustain the momentum on public spending in infrastructure. The budget-related inputs which you gave me... I am quite happy and eager to take on board... Something that certainly will feature is we shall definitely sustain the momentum on public spending on infrastructure because that is the one way we are sure that multipliers will work and the economic revival will be sustainable," she said.

The Finance Minister said that this has been an unusual year and borrowing has been kept at levels so that the government can quickly put the money back in projects. "This emphasis that the public infrastructure spending should have to be kept up has been fully recognised," she added.

She further asserted that the National Investment and Infrastructure Fund (NIIF) is doing its best to attract foreign money.

(ANI)

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