New Delhi, October 26
While the government is all set to collect Rs 15,000 crore from the Coal India IPO, the Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee today made it clear that the government had no intention to “over flood” the market with PSU issues and sell shares at depressed prices.

“ We will not do anything to disturb the market. We will not like to have a situation where our shares will be sold under-priced,” the FM added. While the Coal India shares will be listed at Rs 245 per share, indications are that future listings of PSU shares will be higher.

Recalling that his budget proposals had set a target of mopping up Rs 40,000 crore by way of disinvestment , as against Rs 23,553 crore it collected last year, Mukherjee said that the government would dilute its stakes in seven more companies this fiscal, including 10 per cent disinvestment in Indian Oil Corporation in January and later in Steel Authority of India Ltd in February.

The public issue of PowerGrid Corporation, Shipping Corporation of India and Hindustan Copper are expected later this year.

A confident finance minister projected that the economy this year would grow at 8.25 to 8.75 per cent this year. The FM expressed the hope that the growth rate would exceed 9 per cent in the near future.

The Finance Minister said in the current fiscal year GDP growth in the first quarter is estimated at 8.8 per cent. He said the fact that this growth came about in a year with sub-normal monsoon indicates that the economy is more resilient to cyclical changes in agriculture due to a decline in the share of agriculture in GDP.

He also ruled out any plan to control Foreign Institutional Investment into the equity market. While admitting that the rising Rupee, which has climbed sharply by about 5.6 per cent since the beginning of September, has implications for exports, Mukherjee said he was confident that the current account deficit would be contained at around 3 per cent of GDP in this fiscal.

“ We have faced similar situations in the past and have overcome it without taking recourse to some of the more stringent policy measures,” he said at the two-day annual meeting with Economic Editors.

The partial restoration of the tax cuts, compression in expenditure and revenue from 3G auction and disinvestment will help in meeting our fiscal targets for the current year, he said. Progress is being made on policy proposals announced earlier which included a move towards a nutrient based fertilizers subsidy regime culminating in direct transfers to farmers at a later date; flexible petroleum pricing policy with levels of subsidy calibrated to international crude prices; public expenditure management; a new Direct Tax Code; and progress towards goods and services tax.

On Inflation, he said that after remaining in double digits till June 2010, it has moderated to reach 8.6 per cent in September 2010. In terms of consumer price indices, inflation in the three major groups (industrial workers, agricultural labour and rural labour) have all come down to single digit level. Food prices have been the main driver of inflation.

He said that financial Inclusion is an important priority of the Government as only about 38 per cent of the 85292 bank branches of Scheduled Commercial Banks are in rural areas and only 40 per cent of the country’s population has bank accounts. To address this need, the Government has directed all banks to provide appropriate banking facilities to habitations having population in excess of 2000 by March, 2012.

As per the data made available by Controller General of Accounts gross tax revenue have so far grown by 27.3 per cent, which compares favourably with a negative 11.6 per cent growth last year and 17.9 per cent estimated in the Budget proposal for this year. Customs revenue too has gone up by over 66 per cent during the first six months of this fiscal year.