By IANS,
Bhubaneswar: Orissa Tuesday waved the value added tax (VAT) on cooking gas and kerosene, providing marginal relief to the people after their prices were hiked. A cooking gas cylinder would now cost Rs.407 from Rs.423 after the hike.
The move came a few days after the central government hike diesel prices by Rs.3 a litre, kerosene by Rs.2 per litre and and cooking gas by Rs.50 per cylinder.
The central government asked the states to reduce taxes on the commodities so that the people could get some relief.
“The government of India has again hiked the price of petroleum products recently. This has come as a blow to the people of our country particularly to the middle and to the poorer class,” Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik told reporters here.
“As a measure of relief to the people of our state we have decided that the VAT will be completely waived on LPG (reducing a cylinder’s price by Rs.16) and PDS (public distribution system) kerosene oil,” Patnaik said.
“This is the maximum possible relief that we could give on these products,” he added.
“As far as diesel is concerned the state has already reduced VAT rate to 18 percent some time back which is one of the lowest in the country. It will not be possible for a poor state like Orissa to further reduce this,” he said.
Patnaik urged the central government to reduce the diesel prices so as to give some relief to the common man.