Chandigarh, November 2
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Punjab senior leader and Leader of Opposition, Harpal Sing Cheema has blamed the Narendra Modi-led central government and the Channi government of Punjab for the daily rise in petrol and diesel prices; terming them as ‘lethal government for the people’. He alleged that before 2014, the BJP leaders used to take to the streets half-naked to protest against the rise in petrol and diesel prices and inflation and today, when the lives of the people have become miserable due to inflation; all those leaders are sitting in silence.
In a statement issued from the party headquarters here on Tuesday, Harpal Singh Cheema said, “The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power by protesting against rising petrol and diesel prices and making it an election issue, but the Narendra Modi-led BJP government has increased the excise duty on petrol by 43 percent and on diesel by 68.8 percent; which is a big betrayal with the people of the country.”
He alleged that the Union government had de-controlled petrol and diesel prices but did not benefit the people when crude oil prices fell in the international market. On the contrary, when crude oil prices rose, the burden fell on the pockets of the people; which represented the anti-people mentality of the Bharatiya Janata Party. Cheema said that the Congress government in Punjab was as much responsible for the rise in petrol and diesel prices as the Modi government which had proved insensitive in controlling inflation.
Cheema alleged, “Petrol-diesel prices in Punjab are the highest among the neighboring states as the Punjab government is levying 31.17 percent VAT on petrol and 19.56 percent VAT on diesel.” He further said that Punjab was an agriculture-oriented state and diesel was mostly used by the farmers as various machineries for sowing, irrigating, harvesting and transporting the crops to the mandis were run on diesel. The irony is that the price of diesel in Punjab has also gone up to Rs 100, which is putting a huge financial burden on the farmers, he asserted.
The AAP leader said that due to higher VAT rate on diesel-petrol than the neighboring states, where the consumers were being robbed; the petrol pump owners were also being harassed as consumers were buying petrol-diesel from the pumps of neighboring states. Cheema also demanded from the Punjab Government and the Union Government to reduce the taxes levied on petrol and diesel so as to bring down their prices and control inflation.
