Mumbai, Nov. 2 -- Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday said the dispute within the Tata group should be resolved by the stakeholders themselves and kept out of the public eye, stressing that the conglomerate is too important to India's economy for a prolonged standoff.

"This is a very critical component of the Indian economy and therefore it has to be amicably settled among themselves," Sitharaman said at a Financial Express event in Mumbai. The issue "cannot be spilling out like this in the public," she added.

Calling the matter sensitive, the finance minister said a resolution would require business judgment and mutual goodwill. She declined to comment on whether the government would step in to facilitate talks between the tw...