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The Centre is considering increasing the number of benches of the Board of Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (BIFR), the quasi judicial body for restructuring/winding up of sick companies, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee said on Tuesday. This would help the BIFR which currently has three benches, speed up the process of reviving or winding up sick companies. "Review of performance and expanding the number of benches (in BIFR) is under consideration of the government," Mukherjee said during Question Hour in the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. He added the government cannot fix a timeframe for disposal of cases referred to BIFR.Since April 2009, BIFR has declared 200 firms sick under the Sick Industrial Companies (Special Provisions) Act, 1985, Mukherjee said. "BIFR has recommended 22 industrial companies/units for winding up since April 2009 and the number of employees in these industrial companies/units at the time of their registration was 2,174," he said.Speaking later in the evening in the Rajya Sabha, the finance minister rejected the Opposition demand for any rollback in the petrol and diesel prices. "Sorry. It is not possible as the situation is very difficult, please bear with me and let us wait for better days," he said. He was responding to the debate on Finance Bill in Rajya Sabha after which it was returned to the Lok Sabha. With this, the nine-week budget exercise was completed.In the Union Budget for 2010-11, Mukherjee raised excise and customs duty on auto fuels to garner Rs 26,000 crore. The hike in duties had resulted in petrol price being increased by Rs 2.71 a litre and diesel by Rs 2.55 per litre.On rising food inflation, the Minister admitted that food prices are hurting the common man but asserted that the Public Distribution System (PDS) needs to be revamped and made effective to blunt the impact. PDS must be in place. It must be functional. Sitting at the Centre, it is not possible to run PDS. Primarily, it is the responsibility of the states," Mukherjee said. Asserting that adequate foodgrains' stock available, he said the government has decided to offload stocks to states at prices at which the Centre has procured.Meanwhile, speaking at annual general meeting of the board of governors of the Asian Development Bank, held in Tashkent (Uzbekistan) on May 1-3, 2010, Mukherjee said fiscal and monetary policy stimulus measures have hastened India's recovery. "As we meet here, the global economic panorama is brighter than it was a year ago.
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