"Something going right": Hardeep Puri lauds performance of state-owned companies

Speaking specifically about the strong performance of PSUs in sectors like petroleum and natural gas, Puri, who holds the Housing and Urban Affairs and Petroleum and Natural Gas portfolios, said their remarkable growth even surpassed their counterparts in the private sector.

"Market has gone up 43 per cent and all the PSUs OMC, they have registered multiples of 43 per cent like 120 per cent and 160 per cent, there must be going something right," Minister Puri said speaking at the Times Now Summit 2024.

Notably, Oil India shares rose about 130 per cent, BPCL 78 per cent, ONGC 80 per cent, GAIL 72 per cent, and Indraprastha Gas 123 per cent, over the past one year, respectively, which is much above the benchmark Sensex and Nifty, which rose in the range of 27-31 per cent.

Further, speaking at the TV channel's event, the minister hoped that BJP as a party will get support from areas which were regarded as remote from "us" - the party BJP.

"I have watched 2014 and 2019. This time I am watching something else, I am seeing ground swell of support for a party from the areas which was regarded as remote from us- West Bengal and South India. How much of that ground support translates into seats is to be seen."

Speaking of electoral bond, he termed the instrument to be "gifts" for political parties.

"Every morning you get up and you get gifts thrown up from the other side. These are gifts which come our way, electoral bonds was one of them. We suddenly discovered a party who got 303 seats got 3000 crores worth of electoral bonds and a party with hardly any seats got 1600 crores. I have been overseas, tell me any system across the world where democracy works without political funding," he explained.

The electoral bond scheme, which the Supreme Court struck down recently, was introduced in 2018 so that anyone in the country could donate money to political parties anonymously. (ANI)