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NATION AUGUST 27, 2021 | The Indian Eye 10

monetization or sale of state assets?

Govt and Opposition lock

horns over new policy

Govt plans to raise money by monetizing a range of assets put on the block for

private sector participation, over a four-year period

Our Bureau Union Minister for Finance and Corporate Affairs Nirmala Sitharaman addressing at the launch of the National
New Delhi Monetisation Pipeline (NMP), in New Delhi on Monday.

n a historic move, Finance ready being made, where there states.” Addressing a press confer-
Minister Nirmala Sithara- are assets either languishing Highlighting the strategic ence here, Gandhi said, “What
Iman on Monday launched or not fully monetized or un- objective of the programme, this country has built over the
the National Monetization der-utilized.” Vice Chairman, NITI Aayog last 70 years, is being given
Pipeline (NMP) that includes The Finance Minister while Dr Rajiv Kumar said, “It will to away. There is an excuse they
the Centre’s four-year plan to enumerating the reforms and unlock the value of investments have come up with that we are
monetize its brownfield infra- initiatives undertaken by the in brownfield public sector as- leasing these...The government
structure assets. The govern- current government towards sets by tapping institutional and clearly mishandled the economy
ment has planned a Rs 6 lakh accelerated infrastructure de- long-term patient capital, which and doesn’t know what to do.”
crore pipeline of assets that can velopment and for incentiviz- can thereafter be leveraged for “The BJP and PM Modi say
be monetized which includes a ing private sector investments, further public investments.” nothing happened in the last 70
range of assets put on the block including ‘Scheme of Financial But Congress leader Rahul years. But yesterday, the finance
for private sector participation, Assistance to States for Capital Gandhi on Tuesday lashed out minister decided to sell the as-
over a four-year period, from Expenditure’, which incentiviz- at the Centre’s National Mon- sets that have been built over
Financial Year 2022 to Finan- es state governments to recycle etization Pipeline (NMP) term- the last 70 years. They (Govern-
cial Year 2025. state government-owned assets ing it as a “huge tragedy” saying ment) have basically destroyed
Union Minister of Finance, for fast-tracking greenfield in- that the Prime Minister Naren- what the UPA built and now as
while launching the pipeline, frastructure, said, “At this point, dra Modi government had mis- a last resort, they are selling ev-
said, “National Monetization the list of assets that are coming, handled the economy and the erything that we had helped cre-
Pipeline talks about brownfield are all the central government’s move was aimed at creating mo- ate. To me, this is a huge trage-
assets where investment is al- assets. We are not talking about nopolies in certain sectors. Continued on next page... >>

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