Jagan’s Ads Against Centre On Fuel Prices; BJP Reacts

AP CM YS Jaganmohan Reddy has dared the Centre with front-page paper ads against the Centre on fuel prices. AP government’s jacket-ads in prominent newspapers in Eenadu, Sakshi and The Hindu publications have come as a shocker to many as the ads question, “Petrol and Diesel prices…What was the price hike? and How much is reduced now?” This is a no-nonsense, direct and hard-hitting question to the Union Government against the Centre.

In yet another question in the ad, “The very same people who have increased the price of a litre petrol and diesel beyond Rs 100 and reduced it now by just Rs 5 and Rs 10 are protesting on roads for political mileage. What could be worse than this?”

The ad questions centre on the Central Excise Tax on petrol and diesel and how AP got the raw deal. “Although the Central government collected Rs 3,35,000 crore as the Central Excise Tax on petrol and diesel, it distributed only Rs 19,475 crore as State’s share which is just 5.80 per cent of the total. Whereas the Centre has to distribute 41 per cent of the taxes collected by it to the states. It has collected Rs 2,87,500 crore in the form of Cess and Surcharges, so as to avoid divisible pool of petro income and thereby reduced the States share of petro revenue. In the backdrop of Corona pandemic, doesn’t it burden the States more?”

Further, YSRCP government ads also discussed about the condition of bad roads in the state. It blamed the previous TDP government that roads then were damaged due to ‘negligence’ and ‘lack of maintenance’. Whereas YCP govt claimed that roads in its tenure were damaged due to ‘rains’ and ‘floods’. It said that the present state government undertook repairs of 8970 km of roads at cost of Rs 2,205 crores. YCP govt thus justified imposing Special Duty of Rs 1 per litre on fuel compared to previous government. The ad also in detail displayed the Additional VAT and Cess on petrol and diesel and how it varied in last 5 years i.e from 2015 to 2020.

BJP Serious On Jagan’s Ads!

BJP’s AP unit has strongly condemned the advertisements of AP government and shot back at the cash-crunch state government. Somu Veerraju said the party has taken the issue seriously and going to intensify their protests across the state further. He found fault with AP government for mentioning the state’s shares of taxes. He said how can the state government openly criticise the centre. Alleging that AP is in the worse state of financial situation, Somu Veerraju demanded a straight and specific reply from AP government on why it is not able to reduce the VAT even when the Centre cuts the Excise Duty. Somu Veerraju gave counter to YCP’s senior leader Parthasarathi’s comments too. He asked whether YCP came to power in the state that it will rule the state only if the Centre helps. Talking about the Special Category Status, Somu Veerraju said why will BJP give the Status to AP when the state hasn’t voted it to the power. He said that BJP would show to the AP what it can do to the state if it is voted to the power.