The parliament was informed on Tuesday that the government is not planning to introduce bill to facilitate the privatisation of public sector bank in the ongoing monsoon session.
As per list of business for monsoon session 2022 of the Parliament, no such bill has been listed for introduction, consideration and passing, minister of state for finance Bhagwat K Karad said in a written reply.
In the union budget for 2021- 2022, The parliament said that the government intended to take up the two public sector bank to facilitate the privatisation in the year and approved a policy of strategic disinvestment of public sector enterprises.
A recent report by National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) Director General Poonam Gupta — a member of the EAC to the Prime Minister — and Arvind Panagariya — professor, Columbia University and former vice chairman of NITI Aayog, mentioned that the Centre should privatise all public sector banks (PSBs) except State Bank of India (SBI).
While a lot of speculations were going on regarding the privatisation of banks, the bank employees’ union was never in favour of privatisation. The union also called for protest against the proposed privatisation of banks.
While there was strong opposition from the employees’ union, analysts and senior bankers suggested that complete privatisation of the banking sector may be feasible but it will take more than a decade to implement the plan. The government first needs to improve its track record in meeting disinvestment targets.
ALL INDIA LEGAL FORUM 