Centres request on tax cuts a joke: Jaya

CHENNAI: Due to the VAT waiver on LPG, the State government would face a Rs 16 crore per year revenue loss that it would have otherwise made from the price hike, apart from the Rs 104 crore per year it had been generating so far. In all, the State exchequer would suffer a setback of Rs 120 crore per year.
"It is a joke that the Centre has asked State governments to slash taxes to effect price cuts after it hiked the prices by a whopping Rs 50 per cylinder. This is improper. The Centre's request is not acceptable as it has not considered other options," Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa said.Jayalalithaa said the profits and overheads of oil PSUs played a major role in the pricing of petroleum products and that the Centre had hiked prices without looking into ways of pruning this. She also accused the Centre of taking refuge behind rising crude prices without considering the role of domestically produced crude oil.