PM meets colleagues, no official comment yet

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajayee on Saturday met senior Cabinet colleagues on the controversial disinvestment issues hours ahead of the crucial meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Disinvestment. No official comment was available on the nearly two-and-a half-hour meeting.
Finance Minister Jaswant Singh, Petroleum Minister Ram Naik and Disinvestment Minister Arun Shourie were also present in the informal meeting, the second in the week convened by Vajpayee, for evolving a consensus in the wake of sharp differences within BJP and coalition partners.
According to available indication, the discussions mainly centered around the merit of strategic sale of equity in PSUs, particularly the oil companies -- Hindustan Petroleum and Bharat Petroleum.
Saturday''s meeting follows days of consultations by Vajpayee and Advani with various ministers even as BJP came out openly in support of the government''s disinvestment programme which has been bogged down by the open airing of differences on various issues with raging debate on strategic sale versus public offer route.
To complicate the matters for the government, even RSS said yesterday that government should not privatise strategic oil PSUs and reconsider its policy on majority sale of equity in profitable companies.