In a letter to Sinha, Deora has said that reforms are necessary to restore the institution's credibility and the people's confidence.

The government must make UTI accountable, and people in general must be assured that their hard-earned money will not fall prey to financial skull-duggery and political inertia, he has said.

According to Deora, it is not enough for the government to say that it will back the trust. It is necessary, he says, that `sentiment should be corrected'.

``I wonder why the several representatives of the ministry and the trustees appointed to the UTI have been silent even though the reserves have been dwindling over the last four years,'' said Deora. This has been documented by two internal reports of the Securities & Exchange Board of India (Sebi), he added.

In a bid to bring abouttransperancy in the methods adopted by the institution, UTI must set up a committe including trustees, experts from the financial fields and outside auditors to arrive at the true net asset value (NAV) of the US-64 scheme, Deora said.

Assuming that the NAV is around Rs 10, the goverment must make good the difference between what the NAV is and the repurchase price, which is currently Rs 14.25.

The government should announce the new NAV and the follow-up, corrective mesaures through both the print and audio-visual media, as also individually to the investors to restore their confidence in the trsut.

The government must also announce a new system of audit for the trust. It is not enough for the fund to be audited; it must be audited by the country's best firms, Deora has said.