Cutting across party lines, Rajya Sabha members on Wednesday questioned the Government’s decision to hike Central Excise Duty on petrol and diesel even as the international prices of crude were at an all time low. Agitated Elders charged the Government with “profiteering” and not passing on the benefits of drop in oil prices. The Government, however, justified the hike and said it was needed for funding various development plans like building national highways and rural roads.
Defending the increase in excise, Finance Minister and leader of the Upper House Arun Jaitley said for the first time fiscal deficit target will be met without budgetary cuts for social sector schemes. He pointed out that the UPA Government resorted to cuts in social sector schemes to meet the fiscal deficit targets.
Facing criticism from the Opposition and NDA-ally Akali Dal, Jaitley said earlier Governments used to achieve fiscal deficit objective by resorting to expenditure cuts. He also said that during previous regimes, the expenditure cuts was as high as `1.20 lakh crore and “this is a harsh reality.”
The Finance Minister’s assertion came after the issue was raised by Congress leader Anand Sharma who said the present Government after coming to power has hiked the excise on oil seven times. The Government was now saving more than $88 billion due to fall in international prices but the benefit was not passed on to the consumers, he said and charged the Government with “profiteering.”
CPM leader Tapan Sen said consumers were not getting the benefit due to faulty pricing architecture of oil and wanted the Government to revisit it. Ramgopal Yadav (Samajwadi Party) said it was an irony of fate that despite falling prices, common man was still forced to buy oil at high price and demanded a reduction of at least `10.
Satish Mishra (BSP) said farmers were the worst hit due to high diesel prices and said hike in excise had a cascading affect on all round prices. SS Dhindsa (Akali Dal) and Bhupinder Singh (BJD) said excise hike led to burden on the farmers and State Governments’ fiscal management.