People suffering due to inflation, government busy in tax collection: Rahul

How have you spent ₹20 lakh cr. earned by multiple hikes in excise duty on petrol, diesel, it asks

Cornering the government on spiralling fuel prices, the Congress on Sunday demanded an explanation how exactly has the government spent ₹20 lakh crore that it earned by multiple hikes in excise duty on both petrol and diesel.

Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi in a tweet in Hindi said the Modi government had managed to bring tremendous growth in “GDP — Gas-Diesel-Petrol”. And while the people are suffering due to inflation, the government is busy in tax collection, Mr. Gandhi said.

Party general secretary Ajay Maken at a press conference at the Congress headquarters pointed out excise duty on diesel has been hiked by 820% and 258% on petrol.

“When the Congress-UPA government was in power, the price of crude oil was $108 per barrel, but petrol and diesel were at ₹71.51 and ₹57.28 per litre, which have increased to ₹85.70 and ₹75.88 in Delhi today despite the crude oil being far less than half of UPA rates,” Mr. Maken said.

Without the excise duty, the price of petrol will be ₹61.92 per litre and diesel ₹47.51 per litre. The excise duty on petrol is ₹23.78 per litre and on diesel ₹28.37. In May 2014, Mr. Maken said, the excise duty on petrol was just ₹9.20 per litre and on diesel ₹3.46 per litre.

“The Modi government has earned ₹20,00,000 crore in the last six and half years by increasing the excise duty on petrol and diesel alone.”

Mr. Maken accused the government of fleecing the common man and filling the pockets of a select few corporate groups who are friendly with it.

“The government should explain where exactly has this money gone considering it has frozen dearness allowance of government servants and just about every section of society is feeling the pinch,” he said.

Source: Read Full Article