The ruling Congress and NCP functionaries on Thursday joined the Opposition parties in mounting pressure on their own Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan to end the stalemate over the levy of local Body Tax (lBT) in major cities across Maharashtra, even as shops, hotels and other establishments remained closed over the contentious issue for yet another day.
On a day when the NCP chief and Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar asked the Maharashtra Government to take immediate steps to end the ongoing trade shutdown in major cities across the State, a delegation of Congress MPs met AICC president Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi and asked her to intervene and prevail on the Maharashtra CM to find a solution to the “tremendous opposition” from the trading community to the lBT in the State.
As they handed over a petition signed by 18 Congress MPs from Maharashtra to their president, the party functionaries and MPs Gurudas Kamat and Vilas Muttemwar briefed Sonia Gandhi about the situation arising out of the trade shutdown in the cities of Maharashtra, where the people are facing a lot of inconvenience due to the continued closure of shops and business establishments.
The Congress MPs told their party president that while they were not in favour of the re-introduction of corruption-ridden Octroi, they were all for an “amicable solution” that would benefit traders, municipal corporations and the Government.
In Mumbai, the ruling NCP mounted pressure on the CM, by demanding that a coordination committee meeting of the ruling DF partners be called immediately to review the State Government’s decision to implement the levy of lBT in the State.
Mumbaikars and their counterparts in major cities across the State, meanwhile, bore the brunt of the traders’ strike for the fourth consecutive day. With shops, hotels and all other business outlets remaining shut, the people had to make do without many of the daily essentials which they would have purchased on a day-to-day in the normal course.
With no initiative to end the lBT-triggered deadlock forthcoming from the Chief Minister, a 10-member delegation of Shiv Sena led by senior leader Subhash Desai met Maharashtra Governor K Sankaranarayanan at Raj Bhavan and urged him to prevail upon the DF Government “to stop the implementation of the lBT” in the State.
The Sena leaders, including party’s group leader in the State legislative Council Diwakar Raote, told the Governor that the ongoing strike by traders, merchants and shopkeepers over the issue of lBT was affecting the common people in Mumbai and other cities in the State. They requested the Governor to intervene to end the strike.
There has been considerable unrest among the traders, retailers and other businessmen across Maharashtra, ever since Congress-led DF Government decided to scrap Octroi and replace it with lBT in 24 municipal corporations in the State with effect from April 1.
While the lBT has already been introduced in 20 municipal corporations in the State, the new tax is expected to replace Octroi in Mumbai and three other cities from October 1.
Talking to mediapersons on the sidelines of a function at Satara on Thursday, Sharad Pawar advised the DF Government to take steps to end the ongoing traders’ strike which was affecting normal life in Mumbai, Thane, Pune and other major cities in the State.