State to hike taxes to net 20,000 cr in recession

With a looming economic recession, the TRS government has targeted around `20,000 crore of additional revenue for 2020-21. With the state government already having increased RTC fares and giving the green signal for hiking power tariffs, the finance department is considering increasing land registration fees, and revising land value across the state.

The RTC fare hike and power tariff will not bring the state government additional revenue as that income goes to the respective institutions. But it will save the state from granting subsidies to those departments. It has reportedly directed the electricity department to hike power tariff to fetch an additional `2,000 crore, but without impacting common people.

After TRS came to power it has not hiked power or registration charges, though the latter is to be revised every two years. Officials say this has cost crores in additional revenue. They added there is a big gap between market rates and government rates, also causing revenue loss. The finance department is studying how much of a hike can be affected.

Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has directed that the 2020-21 budget be prepared taking an economic recession into account. In the current financial year, Telengana presented a budget of `1,46,544 crore but did not receive the projected funds from the Centre; till January 2020 it received revenue receipts that were 70.28 per cent of projected receipts, with just a month to go. The

2018-19 budget was

`1,61,607 crore and went down last year; it is expected to reduce further in the next annual budget.