'Petitions challenging disinvestment create uncertainty'

NEW DELHI: Disinvestment Minister Arun Shourie on Monday said that a spate of petitions challenging the disinvestment process in various PSUs would ‘reinforce the impression of uncertainty about investments in India.’
"We believe that in many of these cases like Shipping Corporation, Hindustan Copper where cases have been filed, reinforce the impression of uncertainty about investment in India... these things damage," he told newspersons.
He said the arguments for examination of issues arising out of Supreme Court verdict, halting disinvestment in HPCL and BPCL, had become more important in the wake of several cases coming up in various High Courts against divestment process in PSUs like Shipping Corporation of India.
The Centre had on October 13 pleaded before the Supreme Court that its recent judgment on HPCL-BPCL disinvestment needed "serious reconsideration" as it had "cast clouds" over the entire disinvestment process.
The government has already deferred ‘indefinitely'' the ongoing financial bids for Shipping Corporation of India and Hindustan Copper in the wake of a spate of petitions challenging the disinvestment process in various courts across the country.