Kochi: Cautioning government leaders not to fall prey to sloganeering, Union Disinvestment Minister Arun Shourie has a word of advice for them if they want to do something for the people.

"Buy a pair of ear plugs," said Shourie while asserting that the time had come to junk old slogans.

Shourie made these remarks while speaking at the valedictory function of the Global Investor Meet on January 19 night in the backdrop of opposition from some groups to Kerala opening up its doors for foreign investments.

"Slogans only confuse people and dissipate our national resolve. In India, those who are out of office think that their job is to criticise those in the office, we have to be deaf if we have to do anything," Shourie said as he advised Kerala Chief Minister A K Antony to buy a pair of ear plugs after the GIM.

Calling upon all people to change their mindset and start being confident about one's own country, Shourie said for the last seven years, India had been one of the five fastest growing economies in the world. "Today the country has $ 72 billion of foreign exchange reserves. Indian exports have gone up by 16 per cent in one year and exports to US have shown a 21 per cent growth," he said.

"We must get into the frame of mind of the Chinese," he said while underscoring how they have immense confidence in the potential of their country.

Shourie also said he was exasperated on how wages for employees were still being paid for about 350 public sector units written off as non-functional.

"Of the around 1,000 PSUs, about 350 had been written off as non-functional, but wages for employees were still being paid," he said.

"How can we progress and implement projects when Rs 40,000 crores are being spent every year on subsidies," he asked while noting neither the Centre nor the states had the resources for setting up infrastructure and development projects.

In the last 10 years, the minister said, he had studied 35 revival projects of PSUs on which a huge expenditure was incurred but "not a single enterprise got revived".

Shourie also spoke about how non-resident Indians (NRIs) were wary of investing in India saying, "We just scare them away."

PTI