Banditry is also private enterprise.

One of the ways our most revered Prime Minister has promised to reignite the economy is by boosting infrastructure which is dismal in India. However, the government is bent on the failed Private Public Partnership model wherein a private company is given the contract for building a stretch of highway and in return is allowed to collect toll for 20-30years. In the past companies bid aggressively, even paying the government millions of rupees, to be awarded such contracts. Trouble is that there is hardly any traffic on the so called highways for these companies to get their money back, let alone make the kind of profits they were dreaming of. Petrol is Rs 68/lit, as opposed to Rs 38/lit in the US, because of extortionate taxes and paying toll every 25km makes any journey extremely expensive and irksome so people prefer trains or buses. The National Highway Authority was unable to find any bidder for even 100km against a target of 1500km at its recent auction. TOI 11 July. So in an effort to force the issue the minister is asking banks to lend more money to construction companies. This means that public sector banks will be saddled with even more bad loans and will need to be bailed out by the government. Why not spend the money directly in building highways without any toll? It will pay for itself by increased tax collections from increased business activity, as China has done. The reason India is poor is because of the stubborn refusal of politicians and civil servants to learn from what is happening elsewhere. In Britain the Private Finance Initiative has been an absolute disaster. Companies running rail services have such confusing pricing on tickets that commuters do not understand and if anyone is caught with a wrong ticket he is heavily fined. Bus companies have shut down unprofitable routes in rural areas where they are essential. The NHS, which was the pride of Britain, has been ravaged by cuts while administrators award themselves 200,000 pound salaries. A 38 week pregnant woman was sent home for 4 days over the weekend, even though blood flow to the baby was seriously restricted, because there was a shortage of staff. The baby died. Kane Gorny, a 22 year old man, was so thirsty in St George's Hospital that he dialed 999 to call the police. When police arrived the nurses sent them away saying that Gorny was alright. When he died he had lost one third of his body weight. Private companies concentrate on maximising profits to increase shareholder dividends and bonuses for the managers. They are fine where there is competition as in telecom but even here they must be strictly monitored to prevent cartels forming. No private company should be allowed into a monopoly situation as in roads, railways, airports, water or power transmission. They will kill the people.