Tamil Nadu Congress Committee (TNCC) president B.S. Gnanadesikan has criticised Chief Minister Jayalalithaa for condemning the hike in price of petrol.
In a statement here, he wondered how the Chief Minister who had attributed her decision to raise the electricity tariff to the loss suffered by the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation, refused to accept that the petrol price hike was because of the huge losses suffered by the oil marketing companies (OMCs) because of the highly-subsidised petroleum products.
Mr. Gnandesikan, who conceded that the petrol price hike had hurt the people, especially the two-wheeler and autorickshaw users, pointed out that the import of crude at $ 117 per barrel had been causing huge losses to the oil marketing companies that had to import as much as 80 per cent of the country's total requirement.
There was a vast gap between the procurement price and the selling price of various petroleum products.
The government had to foot a subsidy bill of Rs. 14 per litre and Rs. 500 per cylinder of liquefied petroleum gas. “The OMCs are losing Rs. 8 per litre of petrol.”
“All political leaders in the country are aware that the OMCs have been losing thousands of crores of rupees and the Chief Minister who has hiked the price of milk and power tariff also knows it”, he added.
If the Chief Minister, who had been pillorying the Central government every day through her statements, were to reduce the value added tax, the public would not suffer much.
And that would obviate any necessity for agitations as well, the TNCC chief contended.
Acknowledging that the price hike had been resorted to by the Central government “only because it has become inevitable,” he appealed to both the Central and the State governments to devise ways and means to reduce the price of petrol.
Besides, he wanted the oil companies to initiate immediate action to avert fuel scarcity in Chennai.
Keywords: petrol price hike, Tamil Nadu politics, Gnanadesikan
Mr. Gnana Desikan should know that had his UPA government collected the correct sale prices for the 2G spectrum, this sort of escalations could be met by reducing the central taxes on the petroleum products.
His UPA govermnment is the most corrupt government that cannot govern any longer!
When a problem comes, whether the State Government or Central they find fault with each other instead of solving the problem, though they have means and ends for the problems which will arise in a course of time due to many reasons like mainly due to abundant use by populous city enlargement, and as already pointed out by USA the consumption of per individual gets rise when growth occurs. So when growth occurs everybody has the responsibility of using resources and everybody has moral responsibility of finding of alternative resource,then only the world will thrive for comfort living.
The tax collections from petrol tax is 1,40,000 crores and the congress government made a loss to the tune of 1,76,000 crores by 2G spectrum scandal. If that money is with the government then there is no need to increase the petrol prices. Congress governement has no sympathy towards the indian people. We, the people of India, should know the fact. The suffering of people is the result of corrupt congress and Karunanidhi alliance ruling the centre.
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