New guidelines for SEZ revival soon,says Sharma

Sharma is leading a business delegation on a three-day visit to the Czech Republic.

Sharma was also critical of the tenor of the Comptroller and Auditor General’s (CAG) report and said that the national auditor should stay out of the domain of policy formulation and restrict itself to its mandated role.

In his statement to The Indian Express,Sharma criticised the CAG saying,“These (allocation of coal blocks) are policy decisions. The CAG is not supposed to be peeping in the direction of policy formulation,nor can be prescriptive to the elected governments on what policies they should follow. The Constitutional mandate is clear that CAG is comptroller and auditor of the Central and state governments.”

Sharma also accused the BJP of trying to play “only expeditent politics” amounting to “opportunism of the worst kind”,and trying to sensationalise the matter,which is earning a bad name for the country.

“The report should be debated in the Parliament. How can you jump three steps ahead and demolish the institution of Parliament? They (the BJP) have undermined India’s Parliamentary democracy and assaulted the dignity of the institution and globally brought a bad name to the country by sensationalising and exaggerating the matter. We are a rule-based and rule-governed country,” said Sharma.

Countering the criticism of the opposition parties that the process of allocating coal blocks between 2004-2009 was not fair,Sharma argued it is imperative to look at how natural and national resources are utilised by other countries.

“When spectrum was allocated in America and Europe initially,it was done through the Administered Price Mechanism and not through auction process. If we have to follow the wisdom of those who believe in auctioning everything then there will be no houses for the poor… because land is also a precious national resource. In a welfare state,these decisions have to be made,” Sharma said.