It has become a fashion in India to bash the Public Sector. You start with any topic and suddenly you find reference to a non performing PSU. If you look at the history of PSUs the worst performing are/were the ones which were nationalized after the private sector milked them dry. a sick company was taken over and got more sick. I agree with the general maxim that the job of any government is to govern and not run businessBut this class distinction gets blurred when politics and big money interfere. Look at Wall Street - they trumped on free economy and no controls. when they burst due to greed and poor judgement they were the first to ask for aid and the great free market capitalistic country of the world jumped to save the ones who created all this mess at the cost of honest tax payers.
in India,the BSNL bashing has started.When will our experts ever read between the lines.
First they murdered Air India - (now Nira Radia tapes prove it). They have not allowed the airline to purchase a single new aircraft for over twenty years and expect the airline to make money. Whenever the airline went thro a procedure and recommended an aircraft the opposite lobby (BOEING VERSUS AIRBUS) scuttled the deal. They pointed out how the smaller airlines (private) are making money. INDIAN AIRLINES had to increase fares to accommodate the geniuses i private sector and run on unprofitable routes (like Chennai to Pondicherry with one passenger). The only time when the minister allowed Indian Airlines to wet lease aircraft the company outperformed all competitors miles ahead.
Now it is turn of BSNL. they have not been allowed to upgrade their equipments. Everytime a tender is floated the vultures (politicians, media and private sector) come in and screw the decision. Even with outmoded equipments BSNL mobile was a runaway success. Here too ,look at irony - BSNL and MTNL do not share towers which they share with run of mill new operators. When there was a craze for optical fibre lines the main players bribed the employees of BSNL to an extent of almost eliminating them.Then they found that laying the network was an expert affair and too costly for them. they withdrew with dug up roads allover .relaid with public money and taxes. BSNL is still the only functioning landline in country.
Look at power distribution in Delhi. We gave the distribution to TATA and RELIANCE and the only increase is in power tariff not service.
why India / Even in USA wherever they have tinkered with public utility services like power and water the private sector has miserably failed. At & T was a monopoly and had to keep services at high level with threat of breakup under MRTP
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