Miscellaneous - This Day That Age   

dated May 27, 1956: PM on private sector

To imagine that the Government had only to seize hold of the private sector to achieve socialism would be a primitive and infantile mistake, Prime Minister Nehru told the Rajya Sabha on May 25, initiating a debate on the Second Five-Year Plan. He said the process of economic development was now going to be one of both the private and public sectors existing and trying to function within the Plan, with the public sector dominating the country's economy more and more. "I have no shadow of doubt that if we say `lop off the private sector' we cannot replace it adequately. There is no point in Government frittering away its energies in pushing out those building industries in the private sector when the public sector has a vast field to cover. Growth of monopoly in the private sector should, of course, be prevented. Some people seem to think that the easiest way to advance would be to put an end to the private sector. That would be a most impracticable approach. We want socialism in this country. If we could by an Act of Parliament introduce socialism, we could pass this Act. But everyone knows it is not a process of statute-making. It is a living growth and not something imposed from above. We have enormous difficulties to face. Even from the economic point of view it takes time. I should imagine that at least three more Plan periods are necessary - 15 years from now; or may be 20 years but let us say 25 years, before I can see any real establishment of socialism in this country."

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