[wheelguy]

Autorickshaw drivers are already facing the heat, thanks to covid-19 they cannot take more than two passengers(which itself is a huge hit to the share autowalas), and now due to increasing fuel prices they were forced to charge more which the commuters are not willing to pay or in most cases cannot pay.

“International crude prices have been falling but consumers have not benefited from it. Rather, petrol price has risen by Rs 9.07 per litre and diesel by Rs 8.97 in the last 19 days. Diesel now costs around Rs 77.33 per litre and petrol is Rs 82.06 per litre in Visakhapatnam,” G Vamana Murthy, state secretary of AP auto drivers’ federation, said.

The city has over 30,000 autorickshaws, but only 50% of them are plying due to the two-plus-one rule (two passengers and driver).

“Not everybody is ready to pay Rs 60 for a distance of 2-3 kilometres, and we cannot take more passengers in the auto due to Covid-19 norms. While on the one hand we are not in a position to hike the auto fare given the circumstances, on the other hand fuel prices are rising unabated,” fumed V Vamsi, an autorickshaw driver.

https://auto.economictimes.indiatime...atnam/76637529

[humyum]

Originally Posted by rahul4321

The increase is pinching as I do 50 kilometeres a day in my car for 25 days per month. However, I dont mind (Before anybody jumps in - please remember this is my individual opinion and I do not wish to be dragged into the arguments of what the middle class and lower middle class will be going through)

You don't mind because you can afford it, not everyone of us can. Its like buying a popcorn from PVR at 300 bucks everyday when I know the price outside is 30 bucks. Did they not ban charging higher prices for food items than MRP in Theatres

https://www.hindustantimes.com/citie...lPk5cAgfM.html

How is this any different? I know the crude price, I know the refining margin, dealer margin, I know all the taxes that come and go in between, then how dare the government think that the theatre guys are thugs for charging us exorbitant amounts but they are saints for mugging us through petrol/diesel? Crude is below $40 dollars today, when crude was $140 too, the prices were not this high. Indian hoon, Andha Nahi (I am an Indian, Not Blind)

Originally Posted by rahul4321

My country is cornered on all sides from neighbours who wish to see it fall. Our Armed Forces have hit back at one of the aggressive countries who is now sitting on our doorstep with all its might. If my country needs to increase taxes, fuel prices, commodity prices by 10-20%, I have absolutely no problems. The sorties in the Air do not come cheap. The consumables of the Fighter Planes do not come cheap. The Heavy Troop Movement and Artillery movement to forward bases do not come cheap. The 500 crore sanctioned for defence purchases has to be sanctioned from somewhere. With COVID- the Government's coffers not only ran dry as they were pumping out money for medical, migrants, trains, buses etc but their earnings from GST and other forms of Indirect Tax also dried up as Restaurants, Salon's, Malls and all other types of business establishments were shut.

There is a military budget for that and all that is budgeted or are you saying one skirmish with any country and government will have to start asking alms from people of this country? Where is the emergency fund?

That was thugged long time back --> https://www.indiatoday.in/business/s...435-2019-08-28

When crude was in $20's and $30's since years and higher taxes were being charged, where is that money gone?The armed forces don't live hand to mouth when it comes to budgets but many of us will be forced to start living that way if this loot does not stop. The armed forces fly sorties and carry out maneuvers, drills all year long. If so much is the issue with money, cancel the central vista, forget about bullet trains, why buy Boeing's for PM's travel? Why LCD's worth 170 crores for Bihar election Prachar? (Mods: This is not politics, I am just bringing out the spending's of GOI).

The 500 crore of defense budget should have sanctioned from the Central Vista Project? Or from the Boeing buys? Or from PM Cares Fund? Or from their party funds? Is it only my responsibility to cut my stomach and keep funding all this? Why go to Russia to attend victory day parade? That is dozens of ventilators worth spending right there. The government wants my bucks, I will make them count their futile spends from my hard earned tax payed money too. There is some bucks from each one of us in everything they have spent on till now, the amount might be small or big depending on our incomes, but its there and I demand accountability.

And this hysteria over China, its the governments failure at tackling it diplomatically, so much so that smaller countries are rising up to and its not like they are planning to invade and take over Delhi, these things have happened before and diplomatically have been solved. The central issue in this country now is Corona not China, they can divert as much as they want.

Originally Posted by rahul4321

If this is the price to pay - I am happy to pay it. Afterall, I would rather give this Government the money they need to defend me as oppposed to keep the money in my bank and be taken over by a Foreign Government who will make all of our lives a living hell.

Originally Posted by JojyKerala

I'm surrounded by family and friends who will go to extreme lengths to support any decision the Government makes how much ever it hurts them.

This support with no conditions or strings attached is the greatest strength of this government. What more can any Government ask for?

I am a Gujju, so you can understand how many of these I must be around, I just start and end it with 'Lets talk about something else'.

[rascalangel]

Interesting thread with interesting responses from both sides of the coin. I have a few questions to the more knowledgeable ( preferably with data).
1) who are the people buying this fuel these days? If increasing the taxes to mop up revenue is the solution, wouldn't the buyer be concious of his travels and spend more frugally thus leading to less sales? Does this mean then increase more taxes?
2) a figure of 1.6lakhs crores was quoted as revenue from the increased tax. Is this calculated with sales same as pre covid or current sales?
3) it's been said upteen number of times that only 2 or 3% of Indians pay taxes. What's is the proportion relative to the population eligible to pay taxes?
4) if we require 1000 MPs to function properly what's the point of fedaralized structure? How would having more MLAs be worse than having more MPs?
5) woudnt central vista and other non essential funds better utilized for metros or hospitals?

While I'm still on fence regarding the taxes on the fuel in the long term, since I'm still of the opinion that it is helping the government in the current crisis, the other expenses are absolutely unnecessary. Also someone mentioned how can a person be ugly and handsome? Well he can be ugly in his head but handsome from outside. Sameway a govt can be built on the foundations of democracy but have fascist motives and ideology.

[efgritesh]

I think its an open day loot to further increase already high taxes on fuel. In fact this is a long pending item in Govt bucket in term of recommendation of various tax reform committees to find alternate source of revenue instead of taxing only these essential commodities.

I am lucky that I don't need to refill my tank as the vehicle is parked for 3 months now mostly, except for occasional wheel spin to avoid cracks.

Although, that reminds me if fuel in our tank has any expiry date?

[wildsdi5530]

I'm sure this thread is being monitored by the powers that be.
Am also happy that there is not a lot of dissent here, atleast I hope not enough to cause arrests.
But not to worry, a Plan is already underway to deliver us from all this corona and fuel hikes, just like corona delivered us from a weak economy.
Soon we will have a war against China or Pakistan or whoever else is ready and then all this discussion will be forgotten. So just be patient guys.

[rahul4321]

Originally Posted by humyum

You don't mind because you can afford it,.

You are entitled to your opinions. I am entitled to mine. I have no more time or breath to waste defending my position. I have said everything I have wanted to over the last 9 pages and have defended my opinions comprehensively with more than adequate facts, figures, logic and arguments.

I fully support the Government's decision to hike the prices of Petrol and Diesel! It is not ideal - but it is the need of the hour! Impactful decisions are rarely popular - enough history books have been written on that single subject alone.

[kiku007]

Originally Posted by rahul4321

I fully support the Government's decision to hike the prices of Petrol and Diesel! It is not ideal - but it is the need of the hour!

Sorry if you have already given the information. Could you please let us know when and where the PM, FM, DM, Petroleum Ministry, Refinery Owners or the Retailers gave the reason for the 16+ day continuous fuel price rise?

[rahul4321]

Originally Posted by kiku007

Sorry if you have already given the information. Could you please let us know when and where the PM, FM, DM, Petroleum Ministry, Refinery Owners or the Retailers gave the reason for the 16+ day continuous fuel price rise?

I have nowhere mentioned that the PM, FM, DM, Petroleum Ministry or any other authority has given the reason. The reason has already been captured in the previous posts.

The increase in percentage of taxation is due to the deficit in the transactional value of fuel spend. As various people have mentioned on the thread, many have not been able to get through a full tank of fuel in the past 3 months or to put it in another subtle way - the spend on fuel has been significantly less during the lockdown period. Even after the lockdown has opened up, the spend on fuel is not at normal levels because of a lot of offices which are still operating the WFH model and most of the leisure travel been cancelled due to the travel not being a necessity in these times.

The Government needs a certain amount of fixed inflow each month which has been planned out carefully keeping the public expenditure in mind. In the last 3 months, the Public Expenditure has shot up considerably (due to COVID and Defence) but the Revenue from taxation (especially from fuel) has decreased by a huge margin. I have heard a contrary opinion on this forum that the Public Expenditure in the period of lockdown may have also reduced as the Government Machinery has not been operating at full speed- but I have not been able to find any corresponding data on it. Possible? Yes. Probable. No.

Lets assume neither opinion is right - that is; the public expenditure has not increased but neither has it decreased; lets say it has remained constant. Even then we know that the tax collection has dried up significantly due to the negligible spend in fuel. This is why the increased taxes have come into picture.

As someone on this page commented - "When crude was in $20's and $30's since years and higher taxes were being charged, where is that money gone?", that question needs to be posed to not only this Government but to the representatives of all Governments over the past 50 years. Nobody has bothered to save for a rainy day; in addition to that - scams, corruption, undesirable expenditures, absolutely ridiculous spending by MP's (for example booking train tickets out of the Public Funds but not cancelling the tickets when they did not undertake those journeys), so much more - dare I go on but then the Moderators will not be happy by the turn in the direction of discussion.

I am also not saying the current Government is doing everything correctly and should not be blamed of all of these aspects I have just mentioned. All I am saying is that - the current Government got handed down a Balance Sheet which did not have a large enough Reserve Fund because none of the previous Governments had bothered to maintain one OR had used up all the money of the Reserve funds. Now when the current Government needs to increase taxes on fuel so as to balance their net revenue against the net public expenditure (including defence), how can we hold only the current Government to blame when similar acts of propriety have not been followed by the past Governments. And if they have no Reserve Funds, where else do they now generate the income from which they need to offset the fixed public expenditure per month?

Will we be happy if the Street Lights had to shut down? Or the Governmental Buses which currently do not operate only on the routes of profitability but on all essential routes shut down the routes where there is minimum traffic and no profitability. Would the general public not be inconvenienced if the Street lights had to be shut down? Would the general public not be inconvenienced if the Governmental Bus to their village shut down because it did not have enough passengers and that route was unprofitable to operate? The Government Hospital in my area gave me a tetanus shot for a measly 20 rupees but when my friend visited a private hospital for the same shot- he was charged 240 Rupees including the vial, syringe etc. Where do these funds for these Streetlights, Government Buses and Government Hospitals come from? - the same taxes (including the taxes on fuel) you and me pay. There are a lot of other examples I can take but these are enough to give you a general idea of my position.

Oh, Switch on the TV today and see what the headlines are. Fantastic example of absolute murder of Propriety of Public Funds!

[ramzsys]

I really really don't understand why this government short on revenues is causing undue, unsaid hardships to the people by highly taxing the fuel consumption.

A sadistic administration trying to raise funds from within the money under circulation, instead of pledging some gold or such other resources for more loans or still better, print more notes and distribute it freely and keeping people happy at all times.

[Newpunter]

I received a post on Whatsapp today with the following quote and a photoshopped pic of our dear leader in a suit :

"When you can't control the rising Covid-19 cases in India so you increase the prices of Diesel and Petrol so now less number of people go outside.
Modern problems need Modern solutions"

I think people can rationalize any decision made by this government, without ever questioning their motives .

Earlier, the taxes were being increased because the government needed more revenue to support their wars. But now, it looks like the hikes have been planned to stop people from traveling out and reduce the chance of Corona virus infections, so the government is actually reducing their revenue to save us .

[kiku007]

Originally Posted by rahul4321

I have nowhere mentioned that the PM, FM, DM, Petroleum Ministry or any other authority has given the reason.

So they didn't tell you either. Thanks. It's always good to fact check.

Also I didn't read anything further in your reply because it doesn't matter.

[rahul4321]

Originally Posted by kiku007

So they didn't tell you either. Thanks. It's always good to fact check.

Also I didn't read anything further in your reply because it doesn't matter.

Cool - Thats your prerogative.

I cant help it if you misread/misinterpret my statement of "fully supporting the Government's decision to hike the prices" as being equated to "the PM, FM, DM etc have provided me with the reason of the hike"

[drmohitg]

It is so ironical that after reading this thread, one feels that this price hike is hurting everyone and the citizens in this country are feeling the brunt. The supporters are citing government expenditures in these trying times and hence the need to raise taxes more and more. And then you just come across a news piece that Karnataka government has cleared the proposal to build another statue costing 66 crores. So much for tax utilisation and corona crisis. God also cannot only save this country.

[rahul4321]

Originally Posted by drmohitg

It is so ironical that after reading this thread, one feels that this price hike is hurting everyone and the citizens in this country are feeling the brunt. The supporters are citing government expenditures in these trying times and hence the need to raise taxes more and more. And then you just come across a news piece that Karnataka government has cleared the proposal to build another statue costing 66 crores. So much for tax utilisation and corona crisis. God also cannot only save this country.

Its a shame that they clear proposals to build statues not only at this time of Corona but even in the past when the country was reeling against absolute poverty and unjust enrichment. If a state has extra funds - they should subsidize the cost of fuel in their state. But ofcourse - for them a statue is also of prime importance. Afterall, Cost is temporary - Legacy is permanent.

[drmohitg]

Originally Posted by rahul4321

Its a shame that they clear proposals to build statues not only at this time of Corona but even in the past when the country was reeling against absolute poverty and unjust enrichment. If that state has extra funds - they should subsidize the cost of fuel in their state. But ofcourse - for them a statue is also of prime importance. Afterall, Cost is temporary - Legacy is permanent.

Statues get votes. Cost be damned. It is the fault of the citizens who vote on such issues. Be it temples, statues or the hundred other things that politicians sell. The state in question has one of the highest fuel prices and road taxes BTW!