Petrol pump owners in Haryana are observing a 24-hour-long strike on November 15 in protest against the Centre’s move to reduce excise duty on fuel prices, saying they have been facing loss due to the decision.
The Haryana Petroleum Dealers Association called the strike from 6 am on the day to 6 am on November 16, reported news agency.
The Centre recently reduced the central excise duty by Rs 5 and Rs 10 per litre on the prices of petrol and diesel respectively to give relief to consumers battered by record-high retail fuel prices. Subsequently, the Haryana government announced a reduction in VAT on the two fuels, making them cheaper in the BJP-JJP-ruled state by Rs 12 per litre.However, the decision apparently did not go well with the petrol pump owners.
“We demand the government to hike our commission and reimburse losses suffered due to sudden cut in excise duty,” Palwinder Singh, state vice president of the petroleum association, told the news agency.
Singh said that because the Centre decided to reduce VAT on petrol and diesel, dealers have faced losses worth lakhs. “Therefore we demand our reimbursement on loss,” he added.
Anil Kumar, state president of the petroleum dealers association, alleged on November 12 that the association had been writing to the Haryana government about its concerns but has not got any response.
Following Centre’s excise duty cut on petrol and diesel, 25 states and union territories have cut VAT to give further reprieve to consumers battered by record-high retail prices. The states/UTs that extended additional VAT benefits are Ladakh, Karnataka, Puducherry, Jammu and Kashmir, Sikkim, Mizoram, Himachal Pradesh, Daman and Diu, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Chandigarh, Assam, Madhya Pradesh, Tripura, Gujarat, Nagaland, Punjab, Goa, Meghalaya, Odisha, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Andaman and Nicobar, Bihar, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana.
States that have so far not lowered VAT include Congress and its allies ruled Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu. AAP-ruled Delhi, TMC-governed West Bengal, Left-ruled Kerala, TRS-led Telangana and YSR Congress-ruled Andhra Pradesh have also not cut VAT.