I wish I could believe him. If I did, many other investors and I would have no difficulty in investing in Gujarat Ambuja Cements or ACC to earn a decent return. This is not private interest over public interest, but proper participation in nation building.

While the prime minister is right when he says the country has huge savings, I fail to understand his figure of Rs 300,000 crore. All I am aware of is that the bank deposits are expected to go up by Rs 95,000 crore every year, reflecting the savings.

And if this money is available to be utilised in nation building, I wonder why ICICI had difficulty collecting anything over Rs 500 crore in its latest offerings of savings bonds. The bonds offered a decent 13.75 per cent interest. ICICI is a channeling source for investment in the country. So clearly, there is a chasm between Vajpayee's beliefs and thatof the common public. Why is the public refusing to part with their savings to ICICI in a larger fashion, even for a 13.5 per cent return?

The reason could perhaps be found in a sense of economic insecurity among the common people, who still prefer to hold their savings with themselves, gold or otherwise -- and preferably in nationalised banks. That puts to naught the prime minister's argument about huge public savings available for nation building. But why can't the banks lend to finance the road sector? Banks cannot because the project will not be bankable. You do not want to add to non-performing assets, do you?

The fact is hard realities must be faced. Apart from dreaming, one needs to subject one's dreams to reality testing. Is that not what the international credit rating agencies do in a sovereign rating? And you get upset when anyone applies any yardstick to your workings, leave alone dreams.

Yes, as the prime minister asserts, Bakra Nangal was a dream that came true. But that was an era whenpublic investments were made in huge quantum as a developmental necessity. While huge funds were poured into public sector enterprises, today the nation is struggling with these investments totalling over Rs 72,000 crore producing not more than 2 per cent return.

Bakra Nangal was built with public money. But today the government has no money to take up such projects even to stimulate agricultural growth further. The land under irrigation is not just going up for want of further investments. And that is not the only area. Power is in serious shortage. Vajpayee does not need to dream of six-lane highways. Instead, he could dream of increasing the installed power in the country. And then he could work on converting such dreams into reality.

This will be far more productive, for the industrialists will pay for the power they consume. So would the common man. And then he can dream of cutting down the transmission losses, which will cut down the fiscal deficit by a huge margin.

He could also dream of settinga target for population control, so that the benefit of growth does not get watered down. He could even dream of making the nation literate, so that the political and social process will take a stronger root.

Coming back to power generation, can the government convince the public to part with their savings, and even gold, to be invested in power generation.? It can only do so if it talks economic sense. Want to give power free to the farmers? Subsidies, subsidies and more subsidies. It would be much better if the government decided to call in some foreign consultancy firms (is that not the fashionable thing to do?) and ask them to check out his Rs 28,000-crore proposal.

If you are an industrialist or even a small businessman and if you approached ICICI or IDBI they will ask you a few simple questions. They will ask you for a project report, giving details of investment, source of investment, expected returns, a sensitivity analysis and risks involved. Even within a company the board will insist on such anappraisal.

Why can't we do this at the national level? Then and then alone will everyone get convinced that the government means business. But if the government argued that such public expenditure cannot be put through this evaluation process, the question arises as to who, then, is going to fund it. And why?

Clearly, the government has no resources. Will the NRIs step in? Not really. While they have a legitimate demand for a better reception at home, no one -- neither residents nor non-residents -- can afford to invest in violation of economic laws. All investments have to have the rationale of return. So ultimately, it is difficult to take the prime minister seriously. What we do know is that investments have not been much in other road and port projects in the last three years. And these are cases where projects have been evaluated properly.

If investments flowed into communication, it is only because returns were expected to be attractive. Sinha has rightly stated that he did not exactly say thateconomic growth will be seen in September. But a better reply from him would be for him to spell out in quantitative terms what public investments have been made till date.

Such a statement would indeed help even the foreign institutional investors (FIIs) to stay invested in the country. The latest figures of slowdown in industrial growth make sad news for the investor. Even basic goods are showing a downtrend.

The government has been working on an enabling environment over the last four months. This process has more or less now been completed. But this has not led to a take off yet. SBI had mobilised a huge amount and no one knows how much of this has gone into productive and profitable ventures. All we have is the figure of increased approvals and disbursals from financial institutions. But on the negative side, we have also seen corporate profit margins and growth in turnover come under severe pressure.

So, one is tempted to ask under the circumstances what has the outcome of the prime minister'sadvisory council been. Seriously, the government should move beyond this advisory council and the FII fund managers and ask foreign management consultants as to what they think of the government's plans. Maybe Kelkar could take the initiative. Some one needs to tell the government the truth. Or is it calling the bluff?