Sinha rules out rollback again

March 12: It is very simple to complain about price rise of urea and diesel, but this will have to be borne by someone somewhere,'' Sin...

March 12: 8220;It is very simple to complain about price rise of urea and diesel, but this will have to be borne by someone somewhere,8221; Sinha said arguing that the subsidy bill was mounting and it was not right to leave such a largesse of loan for the next generation.

Referring to the diesel price hike, Sinha told a private channel in an interview to be telecast on Saturday, that only two months ago the government had reduced the cost of diesel by a rupee. 8220;We have only gone back to the earlier rate,8221; he added.

Sinha said fifty paise of the rupee one hike would go to fund road development of national highways and major state roads and the remaining would go towards rural development.

The government, Sinha said, takes into account all such expenses while announcing support prices of crops for farmers. Support prices had increased in the last one year and in both budgets, farmers had benefitted more than any other sector.

Referring to urea price hike, Sinha said since 1994 there had been no increase in prices of urea while prices of all other things had increased. The 1998-99 budget had Rs 22,000 crore expenses on various subsidies, money for which is taken as loans from the market, the finance minister said.

The result is that loan within the country has increased from less than Rs 2.5 lakh to Rs 8.5 crore in eight years time, he added.

The 10 per cent surcharge imposed on corporate tax in Budget 1999-2000 will be abolished by the end of the year as it was levied purely as a quot;temporaryquot; measure, Sinha said.

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quot;The surcharge will go as promised. If revenues pick up, it will give strength to make the tax system leaner,quot; he told Confederation of Indian Industry CII members in a post-Budget interactive session here.

Reacting to the demand of specific industries, Sinha ruled out any change in the three-tier excise slab structure saying quot;if one brick is removed the whole structure will crumble downquot;.

He said the country should move towards a central value-added tax VAT system, adding quot;if 100 countries around the world could adopt such a system there is no reason why we should not have thisquot;.