The Public Challenge

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is looking to rake in 90,000 crore through disinvestments in PSUs. Will the market play along?

- Manu Balachandran

Nirmala Sitharaman, the new finance minister who took over from Arun Jaitley of the previous NDA government, has her task cut out. On the one hand, she has to pull Asia’s third-largest economy from the brink of a significant slowdown. In May, India lost its spot as the fastest-growing major economy in the world: The country’s GDP slipped to a 5.8 percent growth in the last quarter of FY19, down from 6.6 percent in the previous quarter, and lower than the 6.4 percent growth registered by China.

On the other, she also has some significant disinvestment targets to enlarge the government kitty. This year, the government is looking to target 90,000 crore in disinvestments, up from 85,000 crore it raked in last year. The bulk of last year’s earnings, however, came from the central public sector enterprise (CPSE) exchange-traded fund (ETF), a pool of PSU shares, as against the government's desire to sell strategic stake in government-owned companies.

This year, the government raised 2,350 crore in the first two months of the current fiscal. Now, to kickstart the disinvestment process, Niti Aayog, a think-tank that advises the government, has already drawn up a list of 50 PSEs where the government is likely to sell its stake. Air India, the country’s national carrier that has been mired in losses for a decade, is expected to be on top of the list. Last year too, the government had tried to sell Air India, but it didn’t find many takers.