The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) on Thursday condemned the Congress Government in Punjab for increasing electricity duty by 15 per cent with the latest increase of two per cent effected by the Cabinet two days back.
SAD’s spokesperson and former minister Maheshinder Singh Grewal also condemned the surreptitious manner in which the increase had been affected, saying that this would put an additional Rs 150 crore burden on power consumers.
He said that it was the responsibility of Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal to impose new taxes in the State budget which was being presented shortly.
“Instead of doing this, a new tax has been introduced through the backdoor without any announcement,” he added.
Grewal said that the SAD would take up this issue in the forthcoming budget session and also ask why action should not be taken against Manpreet Badal for this “arbitrary” increase. “New taxes can be imposed only after due discussion in the State budget,” he added.
“SAD would take up this issue vociferously in the Vidhan Sabha and compel the government to reduce both the power hike, electricity duty as well as fixed charges being imposed on domestic consumers besides restoration of free units to backward class consumers,” he said.
The Akali leader said that earlier also, the Congress government had increased electricity duty besides making a 10-12 percent increase in power tariff with retrospective effect from April 2017.
“Domestic consumers are now also being levied fixed charges for electricity consumption whether they consume power or not. This was never done earlier and has added to the burden of the people who are already reeling under spate of unfulfilled promises of the Congress government,” he added.
He also alleged that the government has withdrawn 200 unit free supply to backward class community.