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Despite making a U-turn on the populist programmes, Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu is still determined to complete the ‘reforms’ in public sector enterprises that remained unfinished after he lost power to the Congress party in the undivided AP in 2004.
Early in 2000, the Naidu government privatised or closed down 55 government-owned enterprises, including several cooperative sugar and textile mills, in the undivided AP even as the Opposition Congress accused the government of toeing the World Bank line against the interests of people.
After coming back to power, the Congress government shelved the programme. In one case, the previous government attempted to reverse the sale of Nizam Sugars, but the process got stuck mid-way due to the subsequent state bifurcation.
When in Opposition the TRS also demanded restoring the ownership of Nizam Sugars back to the government as the party considers the sugar mill as one of Telangana’s pride possessions.
However, in a bid to revive the public sector reform programme in Andhra Pradesh, state finance minister Yanamala Ramakrishnudu has asked officials to prepare an action plan pertaining to the remaining 44 public enterprises, sources said.
While reviewing the performance of individual government departments in the run-up to the annual Budget, the minister also told the officials that any continuation of these entities in the present form would only add to the financial woes of the government in terms of salary bills and other establishment costs.
As the government is already exploring ways to mobilise resources required for the farm loan waiver programme, an outright sale of some of these entities is expected to come in handy for it.
The AP government is even open to considering privatising the state road corporation (APSRTC), the biggest of all the existing government-owned corporations, at a later date, according to sources.
On the other hand, all the signals emanating from the statements made by Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhara Rao (KCR) so far suggest this state would only be going to increase the role of public sector enterprises including state power utility TGenco and Singareni Collieries Company Limited (SCCL) in the energy sector.
KCR had already given a mandate to TGenco to plan for a fresh capacity addition of 6,000 Mw as he thinks this is the easiest and possibly the quickest route to increase power generation in the state.
On Wednesday, he told the industry associations the SCCL would be made an international coal player after taking over the Government of India’s 49 per cent stake in the company.
