New Delhi, Nov 22 :    New Delhi, Nov 22:  Union finance minister Yashwant Sinha today promised a uniform tax rate for private and state-owned insurance companies and predicted a burst of cash for investment in capital markets and infrastructure as a result of opening up the industry to the currents of competition. 'We have a committee working on tax rates. I would like to give an assurance of a level-playing field between private and public sector firms. Whatever the rates, it will apply to all,' Sinha told the Fifth Insurance Summit organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here today. The minister's remarks assume significance at a time when Eradi Committee is expected to come out with its set of recommendations on ways to tax the life insurance business. Earlier, Housing Development Finance Corporation (HDFC) managing director and chairman of CII's Insurance Committee, Deepak Satwalekar, urged the government to set low tax rates for life insurance firms. He sought amendments in the Income Tax Act, which would benefit the insurer and the insured. 'With the new insurance companies setting up shop, a chunk of the funds will flow into the capital markets. Insurance and pension funds can enter infrastructure financing,' Sinha said. According to him, one of the reasons why Indian stock markets were considered 'thin' was that there was not enough flow of public funds. 'I am expecting that as you expand your business, funds will flow into the infrastructure sector on a scale that we have not seen in this country before,' he added. Sinha sought to dispel the widely bandied theory that public sector insurance companies were ruffled by competition, saying GIC and LIC were prepared to see off the challenge posed by the new band of aggressive private sector adversaries. The government, he said, will ensure that they function as fully, autonomous board-managed entities. The finance minister said there was a difference in opening up the insurance sector and the others in the economy. But he made it clear that private companies had not been allowed because the state-owned giants were faltering. On the contrary, LIC had recorded a consistent 40 per cent growth in its business, much of it from the rural areas. The government's primary motive for the deregulation of insurance, Sinha said, was to create a social security net. The reason the Centre wanted new companies to enter the sector after its deregulation was to mobilise rural savings. According to Sinha's calculations, if this was done effectively, the share of the insurance business in the gross domestic product (GDP) will jump from 2 per cent at present to 5 per cent.