Residents have high hopes from Budget

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar January 31

Stressing on losses suffered by consumers due to soaring fuel prices, Gurmeet Monty Sehgal, spokesperson, Petrol Pump Dealers Association, Punjab, said the government in the Budget should include the provision of ‘One India one rate’ in terms of fuel pricing. Petrol and Diesel should be brought under the GST regime.

Steps should be taken to curb cross-border smuggling. Moreover, the price of fuel in the country should not be fixed on the basis of a nominal value of fuel in Gulf countries. We do not import refined fuel. Hence, pricing should not be based on the standards of countries from where fuels are imported. Also, the government should control the fuel pricing to provide relief to the public.

Jaswinder Singh Sangha, a member of the Potato Growers Association, said the major expectations of farmers was loan waiver so that no farmer would commit suicide due to debts. Also, the limit of Rs 3 lakh for crop loans should be removed so that the benefit of 4 per cent interest rate could also be availed in loans of above Rs 3 lakh. In addition, having suffered agricultural losses due to demonetisation, farmers claimed that due to the absence of the MSP on exported vegetables such as potato and onion, they were continuously facing deprivation. Hence, the MSP should also be fixed for vegetables.

HS Chitkara of the All India Rubber Industry Association, said small-scale industry was not getting the desired support from the government in the way the big industries are getting. The large-scale industry gets every facility but small-scale industrialists are lacking behind. The small-scale industrialists did not get proper space i.e. industrial estate and industrial plots for their units whereas these units are still running in small colonies and mohallas.

Amrit Lal, Chairman, Punjab Bank Employees Federation, said he was expecting from the government that the income tax limit must be increased. Bank and insurance employees are honest workers and they pay income tax in a proper manner. Such measures must be brought under the income tax mechanism under practice which involves corporate houses and bigwigs such as industrialists working at large scale who do not pay tax and they show less profit properly must be stopped.