Port Wings Editorial: Time for PM Modi to keep distance from corporates

Source: http://www.portwings.in/editorial/time-for-pm-modi-to-keep-distance-from-corporates/

The recent episode of Public Sector bank --the State Bank of India (SBI) sanctioning $1 billion loan to Adani Group’s coal project in Australia has opened the Pandora’s Box for the BJP’s top-rung leaders who are very busy in convincing the citizens that it was a genuine process.

Even though the SBI’s top official defended the decision and categorically said that the public sector bank followed due process in granting the huge sum as loan, the closeness between Adani Group’s Chairman Gautam Adani and Prime Minister Narendra Modi has seen among the anti-Modi group as the real pressure for such sanctioning.

Well nobody knows what had transpired between the SBI management and the Adani Group, after which the deal was eventually sealed, political parties, who are dead against the BJP and its ideologies, claim that it was a tacit support by the Prime Minister for the corporate, which helped it.

Since the day when the Prime Minister announced that SBI is granting the loan to Adani, the avalanche of questions flooded in several forums, including the social media and the Parliament has literally drenched both the Adani Group and Narendra Modi in negative publicity.

Though political parties termed it as crony capitalism, online forums went a step ahead and congratulated the State Bank of India for making a new entry into its always growing Non Performing Assets (NPA).

While no one dared to even pin point or raise a finger of suspicion on Prime Minister Modi about the SBI Loan to Adani, it is time for the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to draw a “Lakshman Rekha” where he can keep off the direct reach of corporate with him.

In otherwords, if the Prime Minister continues his association with selected corporates of the country, it would become very easy for the anti-group to paint the NDA as a government run by corporates.

Modi must understand that India’s two ex-Prime Ministers lost their seats after showing their close links with corporates. And the country doesn’t want to see Mr Modi in that list.