New Delhi, Jun 13 (UNI) The Congress on Saturday said international crude oil prices are at present the lowest in the last 15 years, yet petrol and diesel prices are skyrocketing while the common people to continue to suffer under the Narendra Modi regime.
“Central excise duty on petrol has been increased by 258 per cent and on diesel by 819 per cent since the Modi government came to power in May, 2014”, said senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal.
He also said, instead of passing the benefit of lower crude prices to the consumers, petrol, diesel prices were hiked for seventh straight day on June 13.
“Petrol has now become 59-61 paise costlier, while diesel has become 50-60 paise in major cities across the country. The rate revision ended after a 82-day pause on June 7. In six hikes, petrol price has gone up by Rs 3.9 per litre and diesel by Rs 4. Taxation on auto fuels now stands at 69 percent of the price”, Mr Sibal added.
The Congress leader further said, under Modi, the fiscal deficit widened to 4.59 per cent GDP for 2019-20, overshooting the government’s revised target of 3.8 per cent.
“The fiscal deficit for April reached 35.1 per cent of the financial year 2021 target of Rs 7.96 lakh crore due to lower revenue owing to Covid 19. The government’s net tax revenue stood at Rs 21,412 crore in April 2020 revealing a massive 70 per cent decline as against Rs 71,637 crore in April last year. The centre’s gross and net-tax revenue is now estimated (best scenario) to be Rs 1.73 lakh crore and Rs 1.20 lakh crore, less than financial year 2020 revised estimate. This would translate into a revenue shortfall of Rs 1.62 lakh crore from the financial year 2020 revised estimate”, he added.
The former Union Minister said the total GST collection in last financial year grew by just 3.8 per cent to Rs 12.2 lakh crore.
He also said the Central and states’ borrowings have been rising over the years.
“The net borrowings by the Centre, the states and the Central public sector undertakings (PSUs) jumped nearly threefold to Rs 18.89 lakh crore or 9.3 percent of GDP in FY21 from Rs 6.19 lakh crore or 7.1 per cent in FY12”, Mr Sibal added.
Referring to the tax collections, the Congress leader said, it was only 90 per cent of the revised estimate for FY20.
“However, these were higher than the 89 per cent collection realised a year ago. During the year, there were also shortfalls in the corporation tax (-8.8 per cent), income taxes (-14 per cent), customs (-12.7 per cent) and union excise duties (-3.4 per cent)”, he said.
Mr Sibal also pointed out that non-tax revenues were also lower during the year.
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