Hummingbird News Desk
KOLKATA, 27 APRIL: Chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi for asking states to reduce VAT on fuel prices and termed his (Modi) virtual interaction with chief ministers as ‘one-sided and misleading’.
Miss Banerjee said her government has spent Rs 1,500 crore in the last three years to subsidise petrol and diesel prices in the state.
Modi flagged higher fuel prices in opposition-ruled states such as Maharashtra, Kerala and West Bengal.
“Today’s interaction with Prime Minister Narendra Modi was completely one-sided and misleading. The facts shared by him were wrong. We have been providing a subsidy of Re 1 on every litre of petrol and diesel for the last three years. We have spent Rs 1,500 crore on this,” Miss Banerjee said while addressing reporters at the state secretariat.
She also claimed there was no scope for the chief ministers to speak at the meeting and hence, they could not counter the prime minister’s statement.
Blaming the Centre for ‘passing the buck’ on the states Miss Banerjee claimed that the Narendra Modi government has earned at least Rs 17,31,242 crore from petrol and diesel only since 2014. “Now, you are asking the states to take the responsibility to slash the taxes? You don’t talk about the debts of the state governments. Why don’t you tell people about that?” she said.
Miss Banerjee said that her government, despite all the financial hurdles, has been paying salaries to its employees and pensions to retired people on time besides running several welfare schemes.
“It would have been better had the PM not spoken on fuel price hike in a Covid-19 review meeting, it was his agenda,” she said.
Other opposition parties also accused Modi of playing politics during his meeting and “passing the buck” on to states to reduce VAT on petrol and diesel.
Trinamul Rajya Sabha MP Jawhar Sircar today lashed out at the Prime Minister for asking the state governments to reduce the taxes on fuel prices.
Mr Sircar alleged that the Centre itself had earned a whooping profit of Rs 3.7 lakh crore for the financial year 2020-21 only by raising petrol and diesel prices.
He hit out at the Centre for the raising the diesel prices it has cascading effects on essential commodities from rice, edible oil, vegetables and other food products.
Trinamul Congress general secretary and spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said, “Our chief minister has declared that if the Centre gives our dues of about Rs 98,000 crore then for five years, the West Bengal government will not impose any tax on petrol and diesel.”
Tags: #MamataBanerjee #NarendraModi #FuelPrice
