Tribune News Service
New Delhi, June 2
The Opposition, led by the Congress, clashed with the Centre on the health of the economy and issues with the GST regime with Minister of State for Finance Anurag Thakur refuting criticism that the lockdown had a deleterious effect on the economy.
Having saved lives, the government has embarked on policies that showed a sharp economic bounce-back, Anurag argued on a day when the government missed announcing GST collection figures for the second day in a row.
The minister took on critics, especially former Union Minister P Chidambaram. But criticism also came from Punjab Finance Minister Manpreet Badal, former Union Minister Jairam Ramesh and Tamil Nadu FM Palanivel Thiagarajan (PTR).
The minister argued that the Indian economy was not the only one to have faced a GDP contraction and maintained that growth had returned from a contraction of 24.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2020-21 to 1.6 per cent in the year’s last quarter.
The NDA government had been much more generous with cash transfers to farmers and the socio-economically challenged as well as in giving good credit to entrepreneurs, Anurag said.
He did not touch on Badal’s letter to Sitharaman, where he argued that bureaucrats had taken over the work of political leaders at the GST Council in making rules.
Chidambaram also said the “GST Implementation Committee (consisting of officers) became the tail that wagged the dog” and said Sitharaman was treating all FMs who expressed a contrary view “as errant schoolboys”.
PTR termed Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot’s tweet that states expressing a contrary view were kept out of the GoM to report on the reduction of GST rates “distressing”.
Lockdown didn’t impact economy: Anurag