The Hindu Business Line : Chidambaram flays Govt's economic policies

Speaking to newspersons on Friday, he made a pitch for the Congress party's ability to steer the economy towards development, while highlighting what he felt were the shortcomings of the BJP Government.

The BJP, he said, had got its priorities wrong. It had ignored the poor who constitute the bulk of the population.

Its policies were urban and non-agriculture oriented as a result of which there was large-scale poverty and unemployment in rural areas.

The NDA Government could not encourage investments or control revenue deficit and had not used the growing foreign reserves to advantage.

It had also not addressed the low interest rates or carried disinvestment forward.

These are problems that can only be addressed by someone with economic statesmanship. "There is simply no one," he said, adding that the Congress had the likes of Dr Manmohan Singh.

"That is why I believe that Congress's economic administration will be better. It can put together a better team of economic administrators."

`Policy flip-flops' had affected telecom, power and disinvestment.

On disinvestment and privatisation, he said: "Ideally, when an industry is doing well and facing global competition you leave it alone. If it cannot survive then you transfer it to competent hands.

"But the BJP had tinkered with those enterprises that have done well. It had even considered privatising the IOC's retail outlets. What would IOC be without its retail outlets? The BJP Government does not have a clear disinvestment or privatisation policy."

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