Sonia urges PM to ‘follow raj dharma’, reduce fuel prices
‘Brazen profiteering by Modi govt’
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the rising fuel prices underlined the hardships it is causing to ordinary citizens. In her letter, she said that governments are elected to ease the people’s burden, and not work contrary to their interests. She accused the Modi government of using this as a means to “cover up economic mismanagement” and urged the PM to “follow raj dharma” and reduce fuel prices by partially rolling back excise duty and pass on the benefit to citizens.
“The truth is that as GDP nosedives, the prices of gas, diesel and petrol continue to rise unchecked. What is equally distressing is that despite being in power for almost seven years now, your government continues to blame previous regimes for its own economic mismanagement. To set the record straight, domestic crude oil production has fallen to an 18-year low in the year 2020,” Mrs Gandhi
What baffles most citizens is that these prices have been increased despite moderate prices of international crude oil
— Sonia Gandhi, Congress chief
wrote. She said fuel prices are at an historic and unsustainable high. “In fact, petrol has breached the `100/litre mark in many parts of the country. The surging price of diesel has added to the escalating woes of millions of farmers. What baffles most citizens is that these prices have been increased despite moderate prices of international crude oil. To put it in context, the crude oil price is nearly half of what it was during the
■ UPA government’s tenure. Therefore, your government’s act of raising prices (continuously for 12 days till February 20) is little less than a brazen act of profiteering,” Mrs Gandhi wrote.
She added that the Modi government has increased excise duty on diesel by 820 per cent and on petrol by 258 per cent and collected upwards of Rs 21 lakh crores in the last six and a half years. “This unaccounted-for windfall is yet to be passed to the people for whose benefit it was ostensibly collected,” she wrote.
“It was cruel on the government’s part to refuse to reduce fuel prices even when global crude oil had crashed to $20/barrel last year. The whole principle of deregulation and dynamic pricing is predicated on the principle that reductions in crude oil prices will proportionately benefit the end consumers. The fact that your government fails to do so implies a deliberate and conscious decision to deny the common man his legitimate due. Instead, ironically, your government has been unreasonably overzealous in levying excessive excise duty on petrol and diesel — `33 on every litre of petrol and ` 32 on every litre of diesel, which is higher than the base price of these fuels. This is nothing short of extortion to cover up economic mismanagement. As the principal party in Opposition, I urge upon you to follow ‘raj dharma’ and reduce fuel prices by partially rolling back excise duty,” she wrote.
On LPG gas, she said the astronomical rise in domestic non-subsidised LPG gas cylinders to `769 in Delhi (over `800 in many states like Uttar Pradesh) is even more cruel and has impacted every household. “Can there be any justification for the government increasing the price of a cylinder by `175 in two and a half months since December 2020?” she asked.
ON LPG gas, she said the astronomical rise in domestic non-subsidised LPG gas cylinders to `769 in Delhi (over `800 in many states like Uttar Pradesh) is even more cruel and has impacted every household.