Calcutta, June 1: Yashwant Sinha's proposals for a safety net for employees of sick central public sector units where closure is inevitable and for disinvestment in all but industries of strategic importance, have been termed as a move towards "total liquidation of the PSUs" by the CPI(M) Rajya Sabha member Dipankar Mukherjee.Mukherjee said with this, the Bharatiya Janata Party's presciption of not making any effort to revive the sick PSUs, has totally exposed their agenda which was supposed to give domestic industry top priority.
Out of the 240 CPSUs, 160 units are now under the Board for Industrial & Financial Reconstruction (BIFR) and many more are likely to slip into its abmit in the near future, Mukherjee commented. The Budget 1998-99 tabled on Monday, proposed an attractive VRS package for the workers of central PSUs which were on the brink of closure. Mukherjee questioned this by saying that the finance minister has not spelt out what he meant by being on the brink of closure.
He felt that theattractive VRS package outlined in this year's Budget by Sinha was just another new term for the retrenchment allowance proposed earlier. Neither did Sinha specify the names of the sick PSUs nor did he say by how much the non-plan allocation would be slashed from which the wage bill of the sick CPSUs is met. Mukherjee cited the example of West Bengal-based Bharat Process Chemicals Engineers Ltd under the department of heavy industries where the VRS scheme was notified on May 21 this year. According to Mukherjee, the notice said the VRS was to close on May 31, 1998, and there would be suspension of work from June 1, this year.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
