NIF will have to wait for funds, says Chidambaram

New Delhi, Dec 12 (UNI) Finance Minister P Chidambaram today ruled out any flow of disinvestment proceeds to the National Investment Fund (NIF) for the time being.

''The Prime Minister had sometime back announced that funds from the proceeds be put on hold till consultations are complete, so at the moment I do not expect any funds accruing to NIF,'' Mr Chidambaram told the Rajya Sabha during the Question Hour.

The NIF had been constituted last year to park the proceeds from disinvestment of equity in Central Public Sector Undertaking for spending in social sectors like health and education etc.

Replying to a supplemenatry, he said the NIF was not about sick companies. It was intended to be a corpus of funds resulting from the proceeds of disinvestment in PSUs, but no accrual to the corpus has taken place so far and all money has gone to the Consolidated Fund of India.

UNI NAZ MSJ DB1256