Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Thursday said that the government has been taking a series of measures during the past few weeks to control price rise.
"We have cut down import duties on edible oils and the Reserve Bank of India is coming up with tighter guidelines. Already the prices of sugar have shown a decline. New wheat would arrive in the market in the next couple of weeks and hence wheat prices would also fall. When we came to power inflation was close to 6 per cent. Yes, we are addressing prime minister's concern to bring down the prices," Chidambaram said, while addressing the media in New Delhi on Thursday.
He said that he has not received any complaint from any of the public sector banks regarding non-recovery of bank loans.
"On the contrary the banks have told me that about 99 per cent of their customers who take home loans are keen to return the money on time and in some cases they make pre-payment too.
"Only one per cent of the loan takers do not show inclination to return the money."
Replying to question on his diktat to the banks not to raise home loan rates, the finance minister said that the directive applies only to public sector banks and not those in the private sector.
Finance minister also said that the Cabinet has approved diluting of government share holding by selling 5-10 per cent of Rural Electrification Corporation Limited, Power Grid Corporation of India and National Hydro-electric Power Corporation Limitedadding that stake sell would fetch Rs 420 crores (Rs 4.2 billion), Rs 970 crores (Rs 9.7 billion) and Rs 1490 crores (Rs 14.9 billion) respectively.
Stating that it did not amount to divestment, the finance minister said government holding in REC, PGCIL and NHPCL would be 81.22, 86.36 and 86.36 per cent respectively.
The Cabinet has given a go ahead to all the three companies for issuing IPO's which would be done in due course in consultation with book running cum lead managers.
The cabinet committee on economic affairs also approved of awarding 52 exploration blocks under 6th round of New Exploration Licensing Policy VI. Twenty-four of the blocks have been given to Oil and Natural Gas Coorporation while Reliance got seven.
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