09-23-2005, 07:43 PM
Aiyar's antics
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->If they were concerned about the 'people' they would have admitted long ago that the 'Rs 2.5 lakh crores' invested in the public sector would have been much better spent on drinking water, electricity, roads, schools and hospitals. When it comes to these things there is never enough money but when it comes to subsidizing the public sector's endless losses thousands of crore rupees materialize out of nowhere. <b>Atal Behari Vajpayee was the only Prime Minister to make a serious effort to stop this criminal waste of public money but this government has reversed this policy largely because Marxist MPs, without whose support the government would fall, share Mani Shankar's views except when it comes to West Bengal.</b> Their own Marxist government has no qualms about disinvestments but it is banned for the Sonia-Manmohan government in Delhi. This despite abundant evidence that politiciaans and bureaucrats make lousy businessmen especially in the services sector. The 'people' do not stay in hotels or they would have discovered the difference between government hotels and those run by the private sector. The 'people' do not travel by air or they would have discovered the difference between state run airlines and those run by the private sector. The 'people' do not usually have enough money to open bank accounts or again they may have discovered long ago that the banks that were nationalized for their benefit still hesitate to give them loans but have no qualms about allowing government to get away with borrowings that would never have been allowed them if the banks were being run along proper commercial lines.
<b>The damage done by the public sector goes beyond the 'national wealth' we have squandered on it. Thanks to men like Mani Shankar Aiyer running the show the public sector developed a shoddy work ethic that defined India until the rise of the private sector in the past fifteen years showed the world that Indians could compete with the best when allowed to. The public sector cannot because its fundamental principle is that it is there to provide permanent employment to those lucky enough to have patrons in high places. Despite the high-minded nonsense we hear in defense of the public sector, to the ideologically unblinkered it should be clear that the raison d'etre of the public sector is patronage of the kind the Petroleum Minister sought to dispense to his Congress Party friends.</b>
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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->If they were concerned about the 'people' they would have admitted long ago that the 'Rs 2.5 lakh crores' invested in the public sector would have been much better spent on drinking water, electricity, roads, schools and hospitals. When it comes to these things there is never enough money but when it comes to subsidizing the public sector's endless losses thousands of crore rupees materialize out of nowhere. <b>Atal Behari Vajpayee was the only Prime Minister to make a serious effort to stop this criminal waste of public money but this government has reversed this policy largely because Marxist MPs, without whose support the government would fall, share Mani Shankar's views except when it comes to West Bengal.</b> Their own Marxist government has no qualms about disinvestments but it is banned for the Sonia-Manmohan government in Delhi. This despite abundant evidence that politiciaans and bureaucrats make lousy businessmen especially in the services sector. The 'people' do not stay in hotels or they would have discovered the difference between government hotels and those run by the private sector. The 'people' do not travel by air or they would have discovered the difference between state run airlines and those run by the private sector. The 'people' do not usually have enough money to open bank accounts or again they may have discovered long ago that the banks that were nationalized for their benefit still hesitate to give them loans but have no qualms about allowing government to get away with borrowings that would never have been allowed them if the banks were being run along proper commercial lines.
<b>The damage done by the public sector goes beyond the 'national wealth' we have squandered on it. Thanks to men like Mani Shankar Aiyer running the show the public sector developed a shoddy work ethic that defined India until the rise of the private sector in the past fifteen years showed the world that Indians could compete with the best when allowed to. The public sector cannot because its fundamental principle is that it is there to provide permanent employment to those lucky enough to have patrons in high places. Despite the high-minded nonsense we hear in defense of the public sector, to the ideologically unblinkered it should be clear that the raison d'etre of the public sector is patronage of the kind the Petroleum Minister sought to dispense to his Congress Party friends.</b>
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