Cong seeks rollback of taxes on petrol, diesel

Hyderabad: Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) spokesperson G Niranjan on Sunday demanded that the Central and State governments withdraw excise duty and VAT on petrol and diesel.

“The common man who was burdened all these years with heavy fuel prices due to raise in crude oil prices should be benefitted on par with the fall of prices in international market. It is unfortunate the Central and State governments are not willing to transfer these benefits to them. The increase of excise duty and VAT on petrol and diesel by Central and State governments respectively is totally unjustified,” Niranjan said.

Niranjan alleged that due to the ‘mischief’ of Central and State governments, the consumer could get only a benefit of 63 paise on petrol and 54 paise on diesel, although the oil companies reduced the price by more than Rs 4 on each litre of petrol and diesel January 16. “The BJP which always criticised the UPA government for increase in fuel prices is now not willing to provide relief to the consumers totally. It is unfortunate that in competition with the Central government, the Telangana government also imposed sales tax surcharge of Rs 2 per litre on petrol and diesel in addition to the existing VAT of 31% and 22.25% respectively. We demand that both the governments to withdraw the excise duty and VAT immediately,” he demanded.