Manohar Parrikar slams PSU work culture

Using the platform of the private sector organised Aerospace and Defence Summit to slam the work culture in public sector units, defence minister Manohar Parrikar has asked them to step out of the “cocoon of comfort”.

A session with the defence minister is never dull. Peppered with personal anecdotes and delivered in his trademark deadpan style, his messages are tough.

On Saturday, Mr Parrikar had good words for the private sector and rebuking remarks for the PSUs. “Natural habits die very hard. You find comfort in habits which have been created for 50 years, like a cocoon. You don’t want to dig out,” Mr Parrikar said. “There is no accountability of performance. Government only asks for one kind of accountability—there should be no wastage of money. Cost of opportunity is never calculated,” he said during his half-an-hour address.

Narrating one such incident, the defence minister said: “I had to inform a certain officer recently that if you delay a file anymore I will have to record on the file that you have resulted in loss of opportunity to me of so much value It cannot wait any longer. You decide in seven days.”

The proposal related to setting up of mobile towers on wheels in defence cantonment areas, the minister had to endure delays for almost a year.

“I feel quite intrigued by our society. I went for Aakash (missile) induction in the Air Force. It was inducted by conducting a puja breaking a coconut on the missile We have these two minds. One side is a scientific mind and the other one is an indigenous 2,000-year-old mind... These kind of thing sometimes create psychological barriers.

Mr Parrikar also announced the government’s intention to set up a task force where the private sector will be adequately represented. “The small group or platform will work out, suggest and implement”.

Adding, to an audience listening in rapt attention, the 1978 pass-out from IIT Bombay, said: “I am not very comfortable with ‘committees’. Task force is a sophisticated name given to a committee If your intention is not to delay then you set up a task force.”

Cocking a snook at the regulatory framework, Parrikar also alluded to Vijay Malya’s Kingfisher taking huge unsecured loans of Rs 7,000 crore: “Who sanctioned it How was its sanctioned Did he make the proper assessment of the business ”

Aiming to up India’s defence exports to USD 2 billion in the next two years from the present USD 330 million, Parrikar spoke of utilizing the private sector’s inhent strengths too. On his focus on forging strategic partnerships with the private players which is being opposed in certain quarters, the minister said: “After the windows have been well defined, (some) people, who have realised they they would be not be able to go throughthe window, have started canvassing that defence ministry is facing problems over strategic partnerships”.

Parrikar said he had received many letters from VIPs expressing concern about strategic partnerships. “Many a time the letters had similar content, which showed that at times the VIPs were signing off letters written by some other party.