labels: industry - general, economy - general
Government should not sell-off PSUs hastily: KK Birla news
15 January 2007

In a public address after many years, industrialist Krishna Kumar Birla says the government should not be in a hurry to sell-off profitable PSUs. The 89-year-old eldest member of the Birla family also wants to see a focus on agriculture, reports CNBC-TV18.

Scooters are gone and motorcycles are in, is what K K Birla says he learnt from Rahul Bajaj the other day.

"I just met Rahul Bajaj two days back and he said as far as scooters are concerned, those are now completely going to the grave," says Krishna Kumar Birla, chairman emeritus, KK Birla Group

And such was the trend because of rising disposable income, said the Birla patriarch in his first public address in many years. In an hour-long speech on the future of India's economy, Birla said he saw the country's GDP growing at 8.5 per cent a year for the next one-and-a-half decades, but the government must focus on agriculture.

"They should try to see that another green revolution is brought in the country so that the growth, instead of being 3.5 per cent again becomes 7 per cent or 8 per cent," he emphasised.

Birla was a member of the Rajya Sabha for 18 years. Though an active member of the Congress, his views on disinvestment are remarkably different from his party's.

"As far as public sector companies are concerned, don't be in a hurry to sell-off good companies, even their shares. As far as the companies, which are ailing, which are sick companies, certainly sell them off," avers Birla.

He is the eldest in the Birla family and his business interests range from sugar to media, textile to chemicals. Even at 89, Birla is engaged in the running of his companies, but control of his business empire has already been divided amongst daughters and grandchildren.


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Government should not sell-off PSUs hastily: KK Birla