State-owned Air India is on the block. Some time ago, the government of India took a progressive decision on the strategic sale of some public sector undertakings such as Bharat Petroleum and Container Corp. of India. Following that announcement, voices of dissent seemed to echo all around. Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi, for example, tweeted, “The BJP had promised to build the country, but they are working to make India’s best organisations hollow and sell them. Sad.” Various employee unions and even the Swadeshi Jagran Manch have jumped onto the bandwagon of politicians opposing the move. They are all repudiating the wisdom of the decision, particularly of profit-making enterprises being put on the block. Whether this is politics or rent seeking, or both, is not difficult to decipher.
True wisdom lies in the use of resources, including the so-called “family silver”, to meet emergent needs, as also for better returns.
