The tenor of discussion at the last Parts Aid Club meeting and the commitments made by the Soverhment at its conclusion, tend to suggest lat the privatisation programme will gather fresh momentum in the months ahead. On that occasion, not only did the government agree to speed up privatisation but also accepted numerical targets of performance. The government is now committed to privatise at least half of the existing public sector industrial enterprises within the year and also one nationallsea commercial bank.

Since then, the government has replaced the former inter-ministerial committee on privatisation with a full fledged Privatisation Board as an autonomous body. Speaking at the first meeting of the newly constituted Board the other day. Finance Minister M Saifur Rahman has reiterated the government s determination to implement the policy of privatisation with a view to — as he put it — stopping the huge drain on the national exchequer arising out of nigh losses incurred by the public sector enterprises and to improve managerial efficiency, productivity and output In economic sectors.

Pressure is thus building to hasten the pace of privatisation. Considered against this backdrop, the views on privatisation expressed in the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) report on human development in Bangladesh, released late last month, command immediate attention of concerned circles. Not that the report speaks out against privatisation per se. Rather. It brings out the perils on the path to privatisation and urges well considered, measured steps in that direction. The accent is on adequate groundwork rather than hollow promises.

For one thing, the UNDP report presents a precise formulation of the prevalent arguments against privatisation In the country. Results of privatisation measures are seen as disappointing — the way privatisation has been carried out in Bangladesh having led to accumulation of unearned wealth and to a large scale income and Job losses. All this could have been avoided, the argument continues. If serious flrm-level restructuring had been undertaken within a positive framework of public sector reform. These views suggest that, the UNDP report avers, hasty privatisation has in fact been counter-productive in terms of the growth of a healthy private sector.

The note of caution on the outcome of hasty privatisation, sounded by the UNDP report, should be heeded to. Thorough preparations must precede the process of privatisation.

Privatisation entails pains for many interest groups. It might spell loss of privileges, income and even Jobs, to both managerial and working classes in the public undertakings. It hurts rentseekers. The resulting complex Interplay of often conflicting interests could, thus, create frictions and even upheavals In society. Measures need to be thought out in advance and steps taken accordingly well in time, to avoid the emergence of an entrenched resistance to privatisation. Looking nearer to home — in the sub-continent tp be more precise — It transpires that India has set up a special tripartite committee which deliberates on privatisation issues, at times even going to the length of identifying the public sector units’to be put up for sale. In Pakistan, prolonged dialogue with various interest groups, including the labour front, preceded the process of privatisation.

Let us hope that the newly set up Privatisation Board will carry out adequate groundwork to allow the process proceed smoothly, ensure transparency in its operations and above all, conduct its affairs in a manner that gives no reason for social unrest to appear on the scene.